


Phoenix

by StormDancer



Category: One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician)
Genre: (Not From Main Characters), Alternate Universe - Arrow, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Future Fic, Hurt/Comfort, Islamophobia, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, OT5 Friendship, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Racism, Reconciliation, Zayn Malik & Louis Tomlinson Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-06-03
Packaged: 2018-06-01 16:19:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 112,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6527212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormDancer/pseuds/StormDancer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His name is Zayn Malik. For five years he was stranded on an island with only one goal: survive. Now he come home to fulfill the mission of a dying man--to save his city. But to do that, he can't be the man he was before. He must become someone else. He must become something else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> At long last, the Arrow AU! I hope you enjoy. 
> 
> Make sure you take note of the tags--if any of that sounds like something you don't want to read or are worried about, you can come talk to me about the extent of it and whether it's something you'd be okay with, or give this one a pass. 
> 
> However, no prior knowledge of Arrow is required to read! In fact, I've gone far enough off Arrow canon that it might be easier to understand without prior conceptions. 
> 
> Posting schedule: I'm going to post about every 3 days, though I think there will be some exceptions to that given my own travel plans. But assume every 3 days unless stated otherwise.

_THE_ _SETTING OF A STAR? ZAYN’S DISAPPEARENCE_

_TRAGEDY OVER THE PACIFIC: PLANE DISAPPEARENCE LEAVES DOZENS UNACCOUNTED FOR_

_THE SEARCH CONTINUES: BODIES UNLIKELY TO BE RECOVERED, SAY EXPERTS_

_ZAYN MALIK DECLARED LOST, ASSUMED DEAD: THOUSANDS MOURN_

The funeral is bleak. Harry stands as stony faced as he can, and it feels like all his media training, all the long years of learning how to separate his emotions from his expressions, have led him to this moment—standing in a line next to his bandmates, his face blank as the imam speaks. Next to him, there are unabashed tears on Liam’s cheeks, and Louis’s fists are curled so tightly his palms might end up bleeding, and Niall’s brows are drawn like he doesn’t understand what’s happening. A few rows ahead, Trisha stands straight, Waliyha and Safaa held close to her; Yaser is leaning on Doniya, a strong man brought low by grief.

Harry listens to the imam talk, and he wants to scream. He wants to scream at all these people, at the world, at the god the imam is saying will welcome Zayn, at anyone and anything that led up to this moment, when Zayn’s not here. It’s not even in a mosque, and the imam is speaking only as a friend. Zayn couldn’t even have a proper funeral. He couldn’t even get that much. How dare this happen? How dare the world work like this, with Zayn gone, gone gone gone drowned like he’d always been scared of—he must have been so terrified, and so alone at the last. Harry doesn’t know when his life became wishing his friend died quickly, all at once. When that became the best he could hope for.

There’s a reception after, outside in the crisp October air, and Harry grabs Liam as they go towards the family. There was never a question they’d be here, of course—but Harry still wants to thank them for inviting them. For letting them be here, despite everything. With the hand not holding Liam’s, he grabs onto his phone, feels the cold metal. Knows what’s in there.

“We’re…” Liam trails off, at Trisha’s face. There’s nothing to say to that—to the grief. Harry might be grieving, might feel like a part of him has been ripped from him, but he knows nothing compared to the look in her eyes.

“Thank you,” Harry tries instead. “For—for letting us come.”

“He’d have wanted you here,” she says, and for a second, it feels like she looks more at Harry than Liam, than all of them. “He loved you, you know. He didn’t mean—he’d meant to—” She shakes her head, wipes tears from her eyes. “He loved you.”

“We know,” Liam starts, but suddenly Danny Riach is there, putting his arm around Trisha. He has the concentrated look of someone doing anything but thinking about the hole in them.

“Come on, let’s go get you some water.”

Harry watches them go, swaying. Fuck. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. None of this was supposed to be like this.

\---

That night, in a Bradford hotel, he pulls out his phone. It’s masochistic and he knows it, and he doesn’t fucking care, because there wasn’t even a body to bury and he wants to burn this world alive right now, in a way he’s never felt before. He didn’t even know he could feel like this, this rage and grief and terrible, terrible emptiness, like a piece of him has broken in a way that can never be fixed.

He could be with the other boys; they’re all huddled in Liam’s room, and it feels horribly like the night Zayn had left, except then—then they’d been mad and hurt and lost and scared. Now there’s just grief.

But he needs to be here. He’ll join them soon. But first, he lies down on his bed, pulls out his phone, puts it on his chest. He closes his eyes, takes a breath, and hits play.

 _Hey, Haz_. Zayn’s voice fills the room, and Harry chokes. He has the voicemail memorized by now. But it still hurts, like everything in him is being drained away. These are the last words he’ll hear Zayn say. _I know, like, this is out of the blue or whatever—or maybe it isn’t, maybe Liam warned you. Anyway, I—I know it’s been a while, like, but—Fuck, I don’t know. Give me a call back, yeah? If you have a chance, want to talk. I have to get on a plane now, but, yeah._ Harry takes a deep breath for the next part. God, the next part. _Later, Haz. Love you._

Then it’s just Harry’s sobs filling the room.

\---

They reunite, after the hiatus. Harry’s not sure they would have, if the plane hadn’t gone down, but now…now it feels a bit like they have to. Like they owe it to him, somehow, or the tragedy reaffirmed their commitment, like his leaving once had. And it’s good, Harry thinks. He tried out plenty over the hiatus—did a movie or two, tried the solo thing, tried writing for other people. Tried sitting in the dark listening to the album that had come out a few months after Zayn was declared—went missing—and skyrocketed up the charts; tried not to cry at the sound of Zayn’s voice, doing what he loved. And that was good too, fine. He liked the other things. But nothing is quite the same as being on that stage, singing to the crowds. Not the movie premieres, not the solo work, not hearing his songs sung. There’s no feeling like it.

It’s a lot more chilled this time around, the fans older, them older. The songs are their own, and the contracts are more in their favor. The schedules are chiller, give Louis time with his son, them all time with their families. Give them all plenty of time and leeway to do their own things too. There’s less of the rabid attention that had once caged them in.

It’s good. Harry drives a little out of his way every day on his way back to his LA house, so he doesn’t have to pass the house the Maliks still haven’t sold, but. It’s good. It’s still the same rush, being on stage. Being One Direction.

The voicemail’s still on his phone. He doesn’t listen to it often. But he can’t delete it.

\---

There’s a song, on the first album after the hiatus, called After. The first time they sing it live, Liam’s voice breaks, in the middle of his solo, and Harry wishes he could put his arm around Liam, comfort him, but all he can think of is that voicemail, is of the person who’s not here. It’s weird because he wasn’t here for so long even before the plane crashed, but—he’s not _here_.

They sing the song at every concert. The only thing they say about it is in the first interview it’s brought up, the interviewer asks what it’s about. Louis glares.

“Who do you think?” he demands, fierce like if he attacks enough he won’t have to say it.

And he doesn’t. It’s enough. Everyone knows, because if Made In the A.M. was tacitly filled with Zayn, if only in his absence, this one…it’s not all about Zayn, not even a little, because they have lives and other things to write about. But After. After is Zayn woven in, Zayn and the core of what they are, and how he’ll never leave them, not really.

The fans never sing along, to that one. So it’s just their voices and Niall’s guitar, rising up into the stars like smoke.

\---

Time goes on. Liam gets married. Louis almost does. They write songs. They go to awards shows, they perform. Harry does a few movies. He writes songs for other artists, gives them the words he can’t sing. He keeps trying things out, filling his time. He lives, he does. The hole is still there in Harry, the one where once was giggling laughter and a gentle touch and warm eyes. There’s a bit of a hole in all of them sometimes, when Louis touches his Bus 1 tattoo, when Niall gives a particular laugh, when Liam’s hand hovers over a comic book. But it’s not constant, not like it was at first. He’s gone. Harry’d—fuck, Harry didn’t know how he felt about him, never had, but he’s gone.

The voicemail isn’t, though. The voice mail is still on his phone. He only listens to it a few times a year now, on his birthday, on the day he’d left it, but it’s still there. There’s nothing else on the phone. Just Zayn’s voice, telling Harry he loves him.

\---

“Are we really doing this again?” Louis whines. He has a point, Harry thinks, though he’s always so loud about it. “We’ve never been able to pull off choreography. Not even when we were actually a boy band.”

“Just some staging,” their choreographer tells them soothingly. Harry sighs, and wipes the sweat from his forehead before he fixes his bun. He doesn’t know how all the girl groups do it. The room is air conditioned even more intensely than the July heat should warrant, and he’s still sweating like he’s been running for miles. “Nothing intense.”

“Then why do we need to rehearse it so often?” Louis keeps on. Liam snorts from the couch, where he’d grabbed his phone when break was called. He’s probably texting Diana, Harry knows. Maybe he should text Leah, be the good…whatever they are. But his phone’s so far away, and it’s easier to lean on Niall, let Louis’s familiar complaints wash over him. After ten years of hearing them, there’s a comforting constancy in the fact that Louis still whines about everything.

“You good?” Niall mutters, when Harry shifts on him.

“Yeah. Tired.”

“Leah keep you up?” Niall waggles his eyebrows, and Harry rolls his eyes.

“Morning yoga,” Harry retorts. “She insists I keep up my flexibility.”

Niall laughs again. “So, two months? Longer than anyone else, right?”

“I guess so.” Harry hadn’t thought about it that way, but he guesses it’s true. He likes Leah, with her big brown eyes and patience and how he waits for him to finish talking. It’s been a nice two months. Solid. Steady. What he thinks people like Liam and Jeff have, even if he’s never really wanted that before. “She’s sweet.”

“I’ll bet she is.”

“Shut up!”

“Don’t like me talking about your girlfriend that way?”

Harry bites his lip. Girlfriend. After two months, he supposes it’s apropos, but they haven’t said anything about that yet. He’s not sure he wants to. Liam can say whatever the fuck he likes about Harry’s inability to commit, maybe he just hasn’t found anyone he wants to commit to, yet. Or—no one he could have, anyway. Maybe. He’s happy like he is, anyway, doing what he wants.

“Okay, lads.” Harry doesn’t know where Louis gets off on clapping his hands at them like they’re Freddie, when he was whining like a child not three minutes ago. “Lads and Liam. Let’s get this done so I can pick my son up from daycare.”

“Like that’s why you want this done,” Niall retorts, and Louis glares.

“I am a very responsible father—”

“Who doesn’t want to choreograph,” Harry cuts in. Louis turns his glare to him. That’s another comforting thing. As is the way the glare’s a little softer than it might have been, once. A last gift from Zayn, Harry doesn’t want to think; the way he and Louis mended themselves, found their friendship again, if in a different form.

“That may be—”

“Oh god.”

All three of them turn to look at Liam, who’s staring at his phone, his eyes wide, his cheeks pale. “Oh. God.”

“What?” Louis asks, sharp. “Did you click on another crazy fanart link? You have to stop—”

“It’s Zayn,” Liam says, and there’s a note in his voice that makes Harry falter. Something amazed and terrified and in shock all at once. “He’s…”

“What?” Niall snaps, too fast.

In answer, Liam turns the phone to face them.

 _ZAYN MALIK FOUND ALIVE AFTER 5 YEARS!_ The headline reads, and there’s—fuck there’s a picture and Harry can still recognize Zayn from a thousand feet away and he’s swaying, grabbing on to Louis because he’s closest as all their phones start to buzz like a beehive waking up.


	2. Chapter 1

It’s not the noise that has Zayn flinching, when he gets off the plane. He knows that’s what everyone thinks, after five years on the island, but he wasn’t alone there—it was never silent, not once in his five years on the island, not even when everyone else had gone. It’s the lights that make him flinch. Bright London lights, making him blink in shock, almost too much for his eyes. They’re blinding, at first. He doesn’t even know if they’re camera flashes.

His family’s waiting for him as close to the exit as they can. He thinks that they’re keeping his flight home quiet, because this must be big news, so there aren’t cameras, probably—but there’s his family, the immediate ones, all five of them.

The girls are so old. That’s his first thought, in the second before he’s engulfed in them. Safaa’s a proper teenager now, Wali’s an adult. He’s missed so much.

Then they all hit him at once, his mum crying into his arms and his dad into his hair and the girls all around him, sobbing as they hold him close. He’s crying too, he notices, almost idly. He’s crying, like he hadn’t after that first year, really. He’s back. He’s really back.

He wraps his arms around his mother, holds tight. “I’m okay, mum,” he murmurs, then adds, even though they all know it’s not true, him most of all, “I’m okay.”

\---

They didn’t sell the London house, apparently. Didn’t sell any of the houses, Doniya tells him, as they usher him inside. It’s a bit weird, like a memoriam. He remembers all the different parts of it, remembers choosing the décor. Remembers living there with Perrie, then her moving out. But it feels like a different life. It is a different life, probably. He’s been through purgatory.

He devours the dinner his mum makes, as all of them beam at him. His dad hasn’t moved more than a foot from him since they got out of the car, and Wali keeps touching him, like she isn’t sure he’s real. He knows the feeling. Sometimes he closes his eyes and thinks this is all a dream, some nightmare the island threw at him to rip him apart. He’s afraid to open his eyes, then, until Safaa snuggles close into his side, and he breathes her in. He’s here. He’s home. Whatever that means.

\---

The bed’s too soft, he finds. He can’t sleep. The lights are still there, bright outside his window. If he sleeps, will he wake up on the island?

He gets out of bed, wanders downstairs. It’s almost funny, to look at the yard, remember the person he was who scrawled ‘I pissed there’ against the door of the shed, who set up the dummy to shoot at. He’d been so angry, then. So angry and bitter. He’d been so young. He didn’t know what to angry about.

He knows better now. He knows what to be angry about. Charles gave him that, a final gift from a man he didn’t even know, from a man whose presence next to him on a plane made him what he is now. But he’s not the boy who’d raged against a golden cage anymore. Now he’s a man on a mission. And he knows what he can do.

It’s easy enough to go through the house without waking anyone, to take his bow out of the trunk he’d brought with him, bring it back downstairs. The lights are so bright it might as well be daylight to his eyes, though he doesn’t think that was always true.

The arrow is comforting in his fingers, the bowstring a low hum that’s as much music to his ears as anything he’s ever heard. He draws the arrow back, lets it fly.

It hits the dummy’s heart. He smiles, and draws again.

\---

The next day, Sarah stops by—apparently she warned Doniya she was coming, but Zayn doesn’t have a phone yet. She looks at him the same way everyone has, like they’ve seen a ghost, before she crushes him into a hug. He’s fairly certain she’d never have hugged him before, but maybe coming back from the dead will do that to a person.

“You,” she tells him, as she lets him go, “had us worried. Thought I’d made a bad investment there, at first.”

He laughs. It only sounds a little rusty. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. Your album went platinum, don’t know if anyone told you.” She sits down on the couch like it’s her own house, and he sits down too, perches on the edge of the armchair. Sinking into those overstuffed chairs limits his movement too much. He couldn’t get away, if someone attacked. “They loved you.”

“They loved the drama of it,” he corrects, because he remembers how it works that much.

Her face softens. “They loved you too. People wanted to remember that.” There’s silence for a moment, then she shakes her head. “Okay. You’re officially the world’s hottest commodity right now. What do you want to do with it?”

Zayn takes a breath. His album went platinum. Once, that was everything he could have wanted—people listening to him, listening to the voice he’d given to them. Listening to what he had to say, just him. Maybe changing them a little, through that music.

But that wasn’t change, not really. It wasn’t helping. Not like he can. Not like he will.

“I can’t get back into it, right now,” he says, and Sarah nods, like she was expecting that.

“Of course.” She pulls out her phone, checks something on it. “I think it would be best if you made a statement, though. Otherwise you’ll be hounded until you do.” Zayn remembers that, vaguely. Remembers people wanting to know everything about him, chasing him with cameras instead of guns. It’s foreign now. “And not just a tweet. I’ll set up an interview, if that’s okay. Just one. Then we won’t do anything again until you’re ready.”

That’s better than he’d expected, honestly. Platinum, fuck. Maybe dying was best.

“Thanks,” he says, and she smiles, almost maternal. That was the smile that’d made him sign with her in the first place. It’s nice to know it’s still the same. “For, like. Everything.”

“What I’m here for, Zayn.” She stands, looks down at him. It’s hard not to jump to his feet, to be at the same level as her. “This will definitely be an interesting chapter in my career.”

He tries on a grin. It feels false. “That’s what I’m here for, to keep your life interesting.”

\---

There’s an outpouring already, of course. The girls show him everyone who’s texted them, who’s tweeted. He trends, in some form or another, for days. There are people who claim he went underground in a terrorist cell, which has him almost laughing, running his hands over the tattoo on his shoulderblade, others who think he actually was resurrected. Some of the tweets are people who he cares about—Beyoncé says something, which is pretty fucking awesome. Friends, family. The boys. All gratitude, all prayers of thankfulness.

He’s not sure they should. He’s not sure what it means for anything other than the mission, that he’s back. That they think he’s the same person who left.

\---

The interview is easy enough—it’s someone new, who he’s never met before, but he thinks Sarah must have given them a really strict list of what they can and cannot talk about. The weirdest part is being back under the cameras, of everyone staring at him. He’s spent five years learning to hide. Five years to learn to stand out, five years to hide. He wonders what’s coming next.

The interviewer asks all the questions he was expecting, and he gives the answers he knows they want—tragedy, everyone else died on impact. He’s been alone for five years. No one else on the island. He learned how to survive through luck (luck, and Slade, and Shado, but this is not how to remember them, not on TV with bright lights in his eyes. They will be honored elsewhere, with his hood and bow and what they taught him). Everyone takes it all on face value. He learned to lie, on the island. Like he never did under these lights.

“So is there anything that’s not as good as you remembered it, being back?” the interviewers asks, at last.

Zayn presses his lips together. So many things, he thinks. So many things that are different.

“Well, I’d thought I might at least get a Frank Ocean album to listen to,” he says instead, and the interview closes on laughter.

\---

He stays in the UK for a month, first in London, then in Bradford. His mother feeds him until he starts to gain weight back, his sisters eventually go back to school. His father still stares at him sometimes, like he never thought he’d see him again, which Zayn guesses he hadn’t. He gets caught up on things that happened in the world while he’s been gone—hears about his album’s success. About how One Direction reformed, and the song they wrote for him, that has him staring blankly at the wall as he listens to it. He doesn’t—what even is he, anymore? Is he just a ghost? The lyrics of a song? Safaa shows him a video of the first time they’d sang it, of Liam’s voice breaking, and watches as Louis hugs him, as Harry closes his eyes and curls in on himself. He wonders where they are now. Who they are now.

\---

_Gunfire. There’s gunfire and explosions and he needs to get out needs to finish his part of the job so they can stay safe so they can get away, and he’s drawing his bow and running through the mud, shooting and watching men in camo fall, red staining the cloth, and he jumps onto the massive gun and starts to tug, to pull, but the power source won’t come loose he’s going to die here on this island never get home never get back—_

“Zayn—”

_A soldier grabs his hand and he whirls, his fist coming in hard and fast like Slade had taught him, and it connects with a satisfying thwack but the man’s not down he needs to get him away—_

“Zayn, beta, it’s just a dream, wake up.”

_He needs to escape, needs to get out. Survive, that’s what Charles had said. If he doesn’t live Shado’s death will be nothing, Slade with his arrow in his eye, he’ll have failed so much so many. He won’t He can’t. He’d word that, and the one thing he has going for him is he’s the most stubborn fucker to ever live, according to Slade, so he punches again. He misses this time, but he goes for another—_

“Beta, beta, calm, wake up.”

Zayn’s eyes open. His father’s there, crouched next to where Zayn’s lying in his blankets on the floor, one hand curled over his ribs, the other hovering over Zayn’s shoulders. He’s home. He’s not on the island. He’d lived. He’d gotten home. A nightmare. Another one.

“Baba?” he asks, and he hasn’t called his father that for ages, but it’s what comes out of his mouth, a croak more than anything.

“Oh, Zayn,” his father exhales, and sinks down next to him, gingerly. Zayn doesn’t have to look to know what happened. It’s funny. He used to think his father was such a large man, strong, could stand against anything; now he knows he could take him down in instants. He wishes he didn’t.

“Baba, I’m sorry,” Zayn gets out, as his father strokes over his hair. “I didn’t—”

“I know, beta.” There are tears in his father’s eyes again. “I’m just so glad you came back to us.”

But it’s not that easy. This is just the first time someone’s caught him in a nightmare. What if it was one of the girls who woke him up? One of his baby cousins? He’s not safe to be around, and he was stupid for thinking he was. _Selfish bastard._ He’ll just hurt more people here. His family. The last people he’d want to hurt.

He’s just killing time here, anyway. There’s somewhere else he needs to be. A list with names to cross off.

\---

“Aren’t you afraid of flying now, though?” Safaa asks, when he tells them. They’re sprawled out on the backyard, Safaa in a bathing suit soaking up the sun, Zayn trying idly to read. “I’m never getting on a plane again.”

“It was a fluke accident.” It wasn’t. But it was a fluke he was on the plane. “I’m not afraid.”

“I don’t see why you have to go, though,” she says, her eyes wide, and her lips quiver, just a bit. “We just got you back.”

“I know.” He reaches out to pat her knee. It feels awkward, instinct changed to memory of how to comfort someone. How to comfort her. He wonders if they notice. “But I need to be doing something, and so do you. Not paying for you to sit around all day, am I?”

“You would,” she says surely, and he smiles. It’s easy, to smile at her.

“Fine. But you still need to do something. Counting on you to help save the world, yeah?”

“Just…” she trails off, and bites on her lip. It’s like looking into a mirror, almost. “I can’t do it again. Losing you.”

Zayn sits up, leans in so she can look right at him. He stares into her eyes, and its like seeing Shado again, all the other women he failed to save. All the other women he made promises too, so many of whom he failed. “You won’t have to,” he swears. He hopes this time, he’s telling the truth.

\---

The whole family sees him off this time, and his mother starts to cry again. But he gets onto the plane without a backwards glance, without fear. Distance will keep them safe. There is no risk on this plane.

He’s already been through purgatory. It’s time to bring that to those who deserve it.

\---

LA is bright, brighter than London. It’s not even just the sun, it’s just…Zayn’s not used to it anymore, to the hustle and the sun. He leans back in the car, watches the buildings go past. Not many of them are familiar, anymore; they’ve all changed. The billboards advertise movies he’d never even thought of; the styles have changed. Everything’s changed.

The drive twists, and takes them past some gates Zayn does recognize. He wonders if he’d recognize the inside, from when he’d been there once or twice before. There’s evidence of construction. He wonders what Harry had changed. He could have changed things even before Zayn’d gone to the island; Zayn hadn’t been there for a year before that, probably.

If he closes his eyes, he can remember being there, though. Laughing as he tried to distract Harry from cooking some of his health food shit, flicking at his hair and his ass as Harry giggled and pouted those pink lips. How they’d usually end up lying on the couch together, talking about nothing at all as some music played in the background, their legs twined together. It’d been so easy then, before. Before, and before. Before so many things. Zayn barely remembers what he’d been like, then. What it had felt like to laugh like that, to lie with his…friend, and have no cares at all.

He wonders where Harry is now. What he’s doing. It doesn’t matter. _It’s your fault she’s dead!_

They drive down a few more streets, then Zayn’s house is there—house, mansion, it doesn’t mean anything it’s just a home. He’d told Slade that a thousand times, that just because he’s rich now doesn’t mean he doesn’t know that. It looks just like he left it. Even the inside does, he realizes as he gets out, hefting his overnight bag and heading inside. It’s all he has, right now—all he needs.

Someone must have called to get the house cleaned, because it’s spotless, no sign that it hasn’t been lived in for five years. But even then, it’s different. Zayn wanders the halls, dragging his fingers along the walls. It’s good. Better than London. There aren’t as many memories here, not really; wasn’t time before to build them. He can start here again. He can work from here.

\---

Two days later, there’s a ring at his door. He’d been trying to lay low, but it’s hard to do that and arrange for contractors to put in his new basement room, and arrange separately for the supplies so he can customize it to what he wants. He’s gotten a few calls, ones he ignored. He wouldn’t know what to do with the industry people, when he can’t think of music. Doesn’t know what to do with anyone. With people.

So he’s not surprised someone’s come to his door. It’s been a good two days, of sinking back into the silence. Everything out there is so loud, so many people wanting things he doesn’t remember how to give. When he’s alone, it’s all easier. No one to get in his way.

Except that’s come to an end, apparently. He lets go of the bar crossing the salmon ladder and drops to the ground, then shakes out his arms, puts on a shirt, and heads upstairs.

He doesn’t know who he’s expecting, but it’s still a shock, seeing him outside through the security camera. Liam looks the same, more filled out maybe, his hair a bit longer, but he’s still the same memory Zayn had held onto for five years, counting those at home like a charm.

It hits him hard, hard and fast suddenly, and then he’s pressed back against the wall, his head dropped down between his knees as he tries to breath. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. He—what is he supposed to do with this? With them? How is he—they—Harry—he—

The bell goes again, and Zayn takes a deep, hoarse breath. He’s stared into a missile launcher, he faced down men driven insane . He’s not afraid of a man who was once his best friend.

Liam blinks, when the door opens, his jaw dropping—but anything he can say is overtaken by wild barking, then suddenly Zayn’s hit by a mass of blue-black fur. Zayn takes the impact, bracing—then suddenly he’s laughing, as Rhino gambols happily around him. His puppy. His puppy, all grown up.

“Hey, boy,” he murmurs, kneeling down so that Rhino can cover his face with licks, “Hey, been a while. Didn’t think you’d remember me. Didn’t even know what had happened to you.” He’d forgotten, he realizes. Forgotten all about him.

“I took him in.” Liam’s voice is a little hoarse. “I was getting a place here anyway, and like, the pups needed a friend.”

Zayn looks up. Liam’s staring down at him, gaping really, but he’s smiling like he can’t stop. “Thanks.”

“That’s—shit, Zayn. You’re really here,” Liam breathes. Then Zayn’s getting tugged up and wrapped in a big, warm hug. Zayn’s whole body tenses, trapped too close attack—but he catches himself in time. He wraps his arms around Liam too, holds him tight as he breathes him in.

Liam’s a little teary eyed when he lets Zayn go. Zayn thinks once, he might have been too, so he doesn’t comment on it. It’s not every day your ex-bandmate/once best friend came back from the dead.

“Got you all sweaty, sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” Liam tilts his head. “But were you exercising?”

Zayn shrugs. “Come in?” That’s what he’s supposed to ask, he thinks.

“I actually can’t.” Liam’s brows draw together. “I’ve got to get to rehearsal. I just—I had to stop by, when I heard you were here. I didn’t know your phone number or anything, or I’d have warned you.”

“Thanks.” Zayn leans down to pet Rhino again. “And thanks for letting me see him.”

“Oh, he’s staying,” Liam laughs, and holds out the leash. It’s weird, how simple it seems to take it, even as he protests like he knows he should. “Nah, I was always just taking care of him for you. He knows who his dad really is.”

With Rhino taking up his seat comfortable on Zayn’s feet, he can’t say he’s wrong. It still feels weird. The dog. Liam.

“You should…” Liam trails off, then sets his shoulders, like he used to when he was deciding to be bold. “Tomorrow, we’re having a lads night, at Harry’s. You should come. If you’re feeling up for it, obviously.”

Zayn ducks his head, looks down at Rhino again. Five years. Almost six years, really, since he’s seen them. Six years and bitterness and betrayal and death, and he missed them. Missed them all. Distance will keep them safe. But he missed them. _Selfish bastard._ “Will, like—” He runs his hand through soft fur. “Do they know you’re inviting me?” Liam hadn’t been mad. Or he had been, but they’d been in a good place, when the plane crashed. The others…

“Zayn, you died.” Liam says it firmly, and Zayn remembers a time when that voice meant the truth to him. “That kind of killed the grudges.”

“Then, yeah.” Zayn tries out a smile. “Yeah, I’d like that.” He needs to be seen to be living a normal life.

“Great! Do you have a new number yet? I’ll text you the details.” Zayn reels off the number for the new phone he’d been given, and Liam enters the details in before looking at the time. “Shit, I’m late now. I’ll see you tomorrow, though.” He doesn’t pause before he’s hugging Zayn again, and Zayn knows he’s tense under his arms, but it still feels good. “Missed you.”

“Missed you too,” Zayn agrees, and he’s almost surprised to find he’s not lying.

\---

_“You’ve got to live,” Charles says, his hands like a vise on Zayn’s arm. Zayn’s too terrified to shake him off, too panicked to do anything. He’s on a boat in the middle of the ocean and he can’t swim and everyone’s dead and he’s going to die he never told anyone he loved them he didn’t say good-bye to his family shit shit shit. “You’ve got to, Zayn.”_

_“I. We will,” Zayn’s voice stutters, rises high. “We will, right? Someone will find us.”_

_“There’s a secret,” Charles’s voice is nearly a whisper, and Zayn’s heart thumps louder. He’s going to die with a madman he’s going to die oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck. “You need to know. Someone needs to know. They’ll listen to you.”_

_He hadn’t seemed insane, sitting next to Zayn on the plane. He’d seemed cool; chill. He’d listened to Zayn talk about his music, had told him a bit about what he’d done as a businessman. Zayn didn’t usually like to talk to people on airplanes, preferred private planes for that reason, but Charles had been cool. Seemed like he knew things, in a way that had always fascinated Zayn._

_Now, though, Charles is gaunt like he is, both of them close to starving after a few days on the boat with only whatever supplies Charles had somehow gotten on the boat before he’d grabbed Zayn and pulled him onto the raft. Gaunt and wild-eyed, and Zayn would almost think he was high if he didn’t know perfectly well there were no drugs on the boat._

_“Keep this,” Charles says, and shoves a notebook into Zayn’s arms. “You wanted to make a difference. You can.”_

_“What? What are you—”_

_Bang!_ Zayn jerks upright from the floor, his heart pounding. Fuck. He hadn’t dreamed of that day in ages. The crash, mirakuru, the missile launcher, Shado, Slade, all of those haunt him. But not Charles, not often. Charles haunts his day, not his nights. Charles and the responsibility he’d put on Zayn, unasked.

Zayn untangles himself from his blankets, gets up. In the mirror, his hair is a mess, his eyes as wild as Charles’s ever were. His chest is streaked with sweat, pooling around the scars.

He’s not going to be able to sleep again, he knows, as he glances at a clock that says 3 AM. Three hours of sleep. Not bad. He can function on it, at least.

He’s not going to sleep. But he can do something to get out this feeling.

Downstairs, in the basement, he opens a trunk. It feels good to wear the leathers again, to pull the hood up over his face. It settles his heart rate, makes his hands stop shaking.

They’re certainly steady by the time he pulls out the bow. It’s like comfort, like his old teddy bear, as he runs his fingers over it, feels the grooves, the string. This he knows, like he’d once known a stage. With this, he is the nightmare.

\---

_The only reason it isn’t dark on the street is because there are too many shadows for it to properly called dark. It’s empty, almost uncannily so even for the wee hours of an LA night. A McDonalds wrapper blows across the concrete._

_Suddenly a girl scrambles around the corner, panting as she runs, faster and faster. She glances back, her face a mask of terror, and two more bodies come around the corner, faster than she is._

_“Come on, girlie!” one of them calls. A young man’s voice, rough with alcohol or drugs or both. “Just hand over your purse, and no one gets hurt.”_

_“Much,” his companion laughs, like it’s the best joke he’s ever made. The girl doesn’t waste time replying, just keeps running, her blonde hair catching the streetlights and making her shine._

_Her heel catches on a crack in the sidewalk and she stumbles, her knees scraping the ground before she scrambles back to her feet, the men behind her laughing, closer now. She’s panicked now, not thinking; she turns the first corner she can find, then lets out a low choked moan when she sees the alley walls. She spins, but the men are in the opening of the alley now, and their grins are visible in the dark._

_“Come here, pretty lady,” one says, and the girl steps back, her breath loud and fast._

_“Come—” He trips backwards, as an arrow appears in his shoulder, and he yowls in pain. “The fuck?”_

_“What?” His companion looks around. “Is Robin Hood here?”_

_“Fuck, it hurts man!” He rounds on the girl. “What did you do?”_

_“Leave.”_

_The voice is low, rough, husky; accented in an unidentifiable sort of way. All three people in the alley look around, up and down, but there’s no one there._

_“Come out!” the uninjured man yells, and then there’s a gun in his hand. The girl covers her mouth to muffle her scream. “Think you’re a big man with a fucking bow? What is this, the middle fucking ages?”_

_“Leave,” the voice says again, and there’s an arrow in his hand, the gun dropping to the ground._

_“Come on,” the first man mutters, his hand clutching the arrow in his shoulder. “It’s not worth it man, let’s go.”_

_“I want to see fucking Robin Hood!” he yells, and scoops up the gun with his other hand._

_The next arrow skims his cheek. “Do you?” The voice rumbles again, and the first man swears._

_“Come on, he’s fucking crazy!” he says, and grabs his friend’s arm, pulling him away._

_The gun still on the ground, and the girl darts forward, grabs it and starts to swing it wildly in circles. “I—don’t hurt me!”_

_The lighting shifts, just for a second, and she sees—on the rooftop, a man is standing with a bow on his back. He’s hooded, all in some dark color; she can’t see anything more._

_She blinks, and then he’s gone._

_She looks at the gun in her hand, then yelps and throws it away from her, and runs out of the alley._

\---

“You don’t have to fuss, Harry.” Niall rolls his eyes from the wicker couch. Harry would take him a lot more seriously if he wasn’t drumming his fingers over his leg constantly. They’re all nervous. With reason, Harry thinks; it’s been six years, tragedy, so many things. He doesn’t know what to expect.

“I’m not fussing, I’m making it look nice for my party,” Harry demurs, and keeps fussing with the table.

“It’s the five of us, it’s not a party.”

“It’s always a party when I’m here,” Harry retorts. He spins one of the beer bottles, then brushes aside a bit of dirt that got onto the table. He knows it’s silly, but—but Zayn. But he’ll hear his voice outside of a recording for the first time in six years, and he doesn’t know what to expect.

“Harry—”

“Is he here yet?” Louis pushes through the door, throws himself onto the couch next to Niall. He’s dressed up a bit too, Harry can see; put a little more care into his hair and jeans and t-shirt than he might have otherwise. Harry gets that. He’d spent longer than he’d admit to any of the boys in front of a mirror before Niall had gotten here, adjusting his hair, picking out the perfect shirt that would be casual but also look good. It feels like meeting an ex, in some ways, like a reunion might feel like in others. Like a first date in more.

“No.”

“What would you have done if he was?” Niall asks, curiously, and Louis shrugs before getting to his feet again to pace around the deck.

“He better not be late. I only have the babysitter so long.”

“You could have brought Freddie.” Louis snorts. “He’s a lad!” Harry protests. “And Zayn likes kids.”

“I’m not introducing him to my kid just yet,” Louis snaps. Harry gets that he’s on edge, he does, but he still rolls his eyes. He’s so sensitive sometimes.

“Did you see the news?” Niall asks, interrupting. He probably needs a distraction too. Harry can see him twitching like he’d get out his guitar if he’d get away with it. “About that dude, with the arrows?”

“The crazy archer guy who beat up some thugs last night?” Louis lets out a laugh. “People are weird.”

“Yeah.” Harry stops paying attention as they debate whether it’s even real or not, as he fusses more with the cookies he’d made. Zayn had liked Harry’s chocolate chip cookies, years ago. But maybe he shouldn’t have made them, maybe it’d be weird? Maybe—

“Hey, at least he’s not Trump,” Niall says, and Louis snorts.

“Yeah well Trump’s not a great baseline, is he? Fucking internment camps for Muslims. Don’t know why he’s even running again, it didn’t work in 2016 it won’t now. The Republicans won’t even have him this time.”

“Hope not,” Niall hums. “I—”

There’s a knock, and all three of them jump. Harry’s hand goes to his hair almost automatically, to check it. The last time he saw Zayn, he was waking Harry up to get on a plane from Hong Kong, looking drawn and scared and determined and Harry had smiled at him and told him to have a good break, that he’d see him later. That he just wanted him to smile again, or maybe he’d just thought that, that it’d been too long since Zayn had really smiled at him, big and silly and like he really loved his life. Six years. Six years and one voicemail, listened to too many times.

“Is he coming with Liam?” Niall asks, quiet. Harry should get the door, he knows. But suddenly, he’s scared. Terrified. That this is all some big joke, and Zayn’s not here, that he’s still lost in the ocean and Harry’s heart will break again.

“Don’t think so?” Harry’s voice is hoarse. He feels sixteen again, with Zayn coming late to the bungalow. Worried that he won’t like Harry, that Harry won’t like him. So eager to make a good impression.

“It’s exactly on time. He must have changed.” Louis’s quiet too. More nervous than he wants to let on. “Are you going to get the door, Harry?”

“Yeah.” Yeah. He is.

He gets up. He feels like he’s in a dream almost, going to the door—he doesn’t think he’s ever dreamed of Zayn being alive, doesn’t think his subconscious ever tortured him that much, but that voicemail’s in his head. _Love you_. Does Zayn even remember saying that? Harry’s spent five years unable to not remember it. Lying in bed next to so many people, gorgeous, smart, talented, interesting people, remembering those words.

He braces himself, before he looks at the security camera. Zayn’s going to be there. He’d almost fainted, when he’d heard Zayn was alive; what’ll happen now? He can’t faint. He’s not sixteen anymore. He’s an adult whose best friend has come back to life. He leans in, looks—and rolls his eyes with a sigh.

“Liam,” he whines, as he opens the door. “Why didn’t you just come in?”

Liam shrugs, demonstrating how full both his arms are with a tupperware in one arm and a sixpack in the other. “No hands. We out back?”

“You could have put the beer down,” Harry complains, stepping back so Liam can come in. All that anticipation for nothing. It’s sort of nice to know that Zayn still isn’t on time for things. Some things that don’t change, at least. “Don’t let Niall eat whatever Diana baked before Zayn gets here.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve gotten the same instructions from her.” Liam lifts the hand with the six pack to give a bit of a salute. “Just gonna put these in the back.”

“I’ll be right there,” Harry tells him, and turns back to close the door. It’s been years since fans were obsessive enough to try to sneak in or anything, but it never hurts to be too careful. No fans in dumpster, he thinks, and he’s smiling nostalgically as he turns around and Zayn is there.

He’s just—there. Just there, on Harry’s doorstep. Harry blinks, because it’s been so long—he’d mourned for him, he’d been dead, and now he’s here looking at Harry and his eyes are the same, still too big for his face and too intense for Harry’s good.

“Zayn?” It comes out choked, hardly a word. Harry can feel the tears in his eyes. He’s here. He’s really here.

Zayn shrugs, holding out his hands like he’s showing there’s no threat here. He’s just—looking at Harry still, wide-eyed and Harry can’t help it, how he lets himself go and just throws himself at Zayn. It’s like hitting a wall, but it’s a Zayn wall, and he smells different and he doesn’t rock back with the impact and he jerks a little as Harry hits him, but he still feels like Zayn, as Harry buries his face in Zayn’s neck and holds him tight. It takes a few seconds, but then Zayn’s arms come up, wrap around Harry too. He’s here. He’s alive. He’s really alive, and Harry doesn’t think he can ever let go.

He does have to, eventually, though, if only because the other boys are waiting. He steps back, brushing the wetness out of his eyes. No one has to know he was crying. That the hole in him is convulsing, pulling into itself.

Zayn’s still just looking at him, his head tilted almost like he’s confused, and maybe Harry wished there was a smile there for him, but he gets it. It’s got to be a lot to take in. He’s here. Zayn is here. He can’t even process it. His hair is longer, carelessly messy in a way he’d never have let it be before, and his face is thinner, but he’s still here.

“I. Um. I didn’t know what sort of thing would be right to bring,” Zayn mumbles, holds up the wine bottle in his hand.

“That’s fine. Being alive’s a pretty big gift,” Harry says, and shows Zayn in.

He trails behind him, as they walk through the house out back. He feels like he should say something, but he’s not sure what there is to say—a joke, his old standby? But something about Zayn doesn’t feel like a joking mood. And Harry shouldn’t need a joke with Zayn, who once was the one person he could be quiet with.

It doesn’t matter anyway, because Zayn’s outside before Harry can think of what to say, and then everyone’s staring at him. Louis’s frozen mid-bicker with Liam, Niall’s knuckles are white where he’s grabbing at his wrist.

Zayn just stands there, waits. His chin’s tipped up, like he always used to do when he was trying to bravado his way through situations he didn’t like, but there’s none of the challenge he used to always have at times like this—the way he threw himself at the world and dared the world to fight him. Harry’d always admired that a bit, how he’d rather have the world against him than change himself, but this isn’t that. This is just waiting, like he knows he can take anything the world throws at him.

“Um. Hi?” he says, with that same open-handed gesture, and Niall starts to giggle.

It takes a while, but eventually, after they all hug Zayn again, they’re all settled down again with beer or wine and snacks. Harry’s not quite sure how it happens, but Zayn takes the one chair, away from the two loveseats that the rest of them end up on, but it doesn’t feel like a snub. Or Harry doesn’t think so, not like it might have five years ago.

“So,” Louis says, when Harry was about to make some sort of joke about reunion tours just to keep things going. “What was it like? On the island?”

All of Zayn’s muscles tense. He’s got a lot of them, Harry can see, more than he ever had before—if once he was lean, now he’s all whipcord muscle, like there’s no fat on him, any hint of boyishness burned away. “Merciless,” Zayn says simply, his eyes focused somewhere in the sky.

“You really didn’t talk to anyone for five years?” Louis presses, leaning forward. “That’s a bit much even for you. How are you even sane?”

Zayn’s lips twist into a wry smile. “Catch me up,” he demands, without answering. He’s still so tense, and if it was seven years ago Harry might go over to him, slide into the chair next to him and cuddle him until all the tension was gone. Now, he swirls his wine, wishes he knew what to say. “I hear you guy have been doing well?”

“The world’s falling apart, but we’re doing well,” Niall agrees, snorting into his beer.

“The world?” Zayn echoes, an eyebrow raised. He’s drinking his beer slowly. Harry wonders how long it’s been since he had a beer, if he didn’t during the month he was home. If he’s going to get drunk.

“Ignore him, he’s obsessed with the American elections.” Louis rolls his eyes.

“You live here, you should be too,” Niall retorts. “Your son’s American. Do you really want him living in a country with internment camps?”

“Internment camps?” Zayn repeats, his eyes narrowing.

“There’s no way Trump’s going to win, or that’s going to pass.” Liam rolls his eyes as well, gets to his feet. “Are any of you going to eat Diana’s cupcakes? Zayn, you need to have one, she made them just for you.”

Zayn’s face does something Harry can’t figure out, something confused. “For me?”

“Yeah, I might have talked a bit about you, she’s anxious to meet you. Oh, Diana’s my wife, guess I should have led with that. Here, try one!” Liam thrusts out a hand with a cupcake on it to Zayn, and Zayn jerks away, twisting with the hand not holding his beer coming up to cover his face.

“Sorry,” Zayn laughs awkwardly, and takes the cupcake.

Harry sits back and watches, as they fill Zayn in about the band, about Diana and Freddie and everyone else. He’d contribute if he had things to say, and does, but he wants to watch, too. Wants to let the reality of Zayn being here to sink in.

It’s Zayn—but is it his Zayn? The Zayn who’d let Harry touch his face in interviews, who would talk late into the night with Harry, who’d chatter on about nothing when you let him. For the first time, Harry really thinks the word mysterious might apply to him. He’s just…quieter. He listens to the boys talk, but he doesn’t say much. And he’s...grimmer, is the only word Harry can think for it. He smiles, he laughs, but not like he used to. Like he’s forgotten how to do it. There’s a part of Harry that just wants to make him smile, to see if he can get him to give Harry the sort of fond, incredulous smile that he used to give Harry, or the tongue behind his teeth sparkling eyes smile that had always lit something in Harry, made him want to preen. But he doesn’t know how to do that. Doesn’t know if he should.

“And of course, Harry’s got Leah.”

“What?” Harry zones back in, at the mention of his name.

“Three months, right?” Liam smiles proudly at Harry. “Settling down at last.”

Harry shifts in his seat. Zayn’s turned to Harry, is just looking at him, and once again Harry can’t read his face. It’s not like Harry has anything to feel guilty about, he reminds himself. Zayn and he’d—there’d never been a word spoken. No claim. No hint of one, even. Zayn’d been engaged, for god’s sake. They hadn’t talked in months before the engagement broke, before Zayn had—disappeared. Whatever had been between them was nothing to make Harry feel guilty that he was sleeping with someone else, but then again, it hadn’t been when they were kids either, and Harry’d come downstairs to see Zayn eying the hickies on his neck in a way that made Harry blush.

“Yeah, she’s sweet,” he agrees. “It’s not, I don’t know if I’d call it serious yet.”

“Three months, though. That’s basically married for you,” Niall teases. Harry glances down, tugs at a thread on his jeans. It’s not. He doesn’t know why they’ve all decided that he and Leah are so serious. They aren’t. Maybe they could head there, if they wanted, but Harry’s not—he’s not. He doesn’t do serious, never has. He knows they all want him to, to settle down, but he doesn’t see what’s wrong with this. With having fun. With doing the interesting parts of a relationship, the rush of infatuation, and not the slog.

“Like you’ve ever had a relationship that long,” he tells Niall, groans.

“God, you and my mum. I’m twenty seven. Other than Payno, who’s married?”

“I tried—”

“That doesn’t count. It broke up before you could get to the altar.”

“By a day! And it wasn’t my fault.”

“Doesn’t.”

“Does!”

It’s not quite a smile on Zayn’s face, not like the ones he used to have—but Harry thinks its something.

\---

He doesn’t get it. The list of names is just as impenetrable now as it was five years ago, even if Zayn had googled all of them already. They’re just all the same, rich conservative people of various sort of walks of life, lawyers and finance people and other sort of moguls.

Zayn groans, and pushes back from his chair in the basement. It’s almost set up how he wants it. Half of the area is the work out section, with his target dummies and sparring dummies and the salmon ladder. The half-arc of desks, with a computer that he can muddle his way through at least, is in the center of the room. On one side are a few worktables and cabinets. On the other is the trunk with the hood and his bow, a cabinet with the other weapons he’s been slowly acquiring with his new contacts, as well as a few gadgets he couldn’t resist—the flash bangs, the recording devices, the decoys. The back opens to a garage to the outside, for the bike waiting for him. It’s lit brightly enough that he can see, but not fluorescent in the way that hurts his eyes; it’s almost relaxing, like he could be back in his cave on the island. All in all the basement isn’t complete yet, he still has some things to add, but it’s getting there.

At least it is. His mission—the thing he needs to do, the way he needs to change things—isn’t. He knows something is going on. He’s just not smart enough to figure it out. _A predator hunts. So, pretty boy—are you a predator, or something hunted?_ He’d hunt if he knew what to hunt, he tells the Slade in his head. Slade never had just a list of names to work from, no hint of what could connect them, what the catastrophe Charles had mentioned could be.

He gets up from the desk. At least the salmon ladder is set up, so he strips off his shirt to start on it. It’s good, to feel the burn of his muscles, the way his body moves like it’s supposed to. He’d scorned that simple pleasure once, but now he knows its worth.

It’s a way to do something, at least. His body’s what kept him alive, not a pretty face or a nice voice or whatever got him stardom. It’s going to give him something. Let him do something. Got him off the island, back to this place. Even if he’s not sure that’s a good thing, always.

He drops to the ground, shakes out his arms, rolls his shoulders, and heads to the sparring dummy. He hadn’t had anything like this on the island, but thugs just aren’t keeping him where he needs to be. He should be tackling real threats, and he’s trying, but he just—he doesn’t know where to start. He’s not actually a hero, just a poor boy who rose high and fell fast. _It’s your fault she’s dead_ Fell so far, so the people who once called him brother now don’t know how to look at him. Or maybe he hadn’t known how to look at them. How to talk to them. Everything they said sounded like it came from a different world.

The smack of his arm against the dummy is satisfying. _Not good enough, pretty boy. Don’t half ass it. Kill or be killed._ He pushes Slades voice away, strikes again. This time it’s Shado, with her deceptively deadly hands and soft voice. _You’re trying too hard. Force isn’t everything. It has to flow from your core, from you._ Then it’s Charles, _I gave you a mission, it’s time to start_ , then Harry’s _fuck, Zayn_ , from that afternoon and the last gasp of too many men and Rhino’s barking and he can’t stop hitting it, doesn’t want to, wants to hit it until all the voices in his head are just fucking _quiet_.

The dummy falls to the floor, and Zayn braces his hands on his knees, panting. They’re not quiet. They’re never quiet. He’s got too many ghosts to leave him alone.

Rhino’s still barking, though. Zayn glances over to the security monitor near the door. It’s light out. He doesn’t know when that happened. It’s light out, and someone’s there.

He pushes a hand back through his hair, and jogs upstairs. The person’s still there when he gets upstairs, and he takes a deep breath before he opens the door.

“Oh, hey!” Harry grins, bright as the sun, and Zayn blinks. Harry. He’d figured the boys had done their duty, wouldn’t want to see him anymore. They hadn’t been on good terms before he’d gone to the island, they lived in different worlds now. So what is Harry doing here?

“Um. Hey.” Zayn pushes his hair back again.

“I just thought I’d stop by, see if you needed anything.” Harry says. He glances at Zayn, then quickly away. “Also, food.” He gestures with the pan in his hand. “If you want me here. If you don’t, that’s fine, I can go. I was just passing.”

“No.” Zayn surprises himself by saying it, but it’s true. “Come in.”

“I’ve never been here, it’s nice.” Out of the corner of his eyes, Zayn can see Harry looking around, surveying the house. Zayn’s not sure what he sees. It’s very much to his taste, or what was his taste. Which makes sense, he guesses; he did decorate it. “You have a graffiti wall here, right?”

“Haven’t done anything with it,” Zayn replies. “Um, living room’s here, or kitchen’s through there, or we can hang out by the pool. I should take a shower, though?”

“Oh, don’t on my account. It’s a nice look.” Harry smirks, the flirtation as easy as breathing, and Zayn shifts his weight. Once, he knows, flirtation was easy as breathing to him, especially with Harry. He’d flirted with Shado, he thinks. Or maybe they’d just fallen together, desperate and lonely and the nearest thing each other had to comfort.

“Sorry.” The way Zayn didn’t respond must have been obvious. Harry fiddles with his hair, the same tell he’d always had. “I didn’t—I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Zayn takes another breath. This isn’t the island. This isn’t the war. Harry doesn’t mean anything by it. He’s just Harry, being Harry. The same Harry he’s always been. “No, ‘s fine. I just…” he shakes his head. “Let’s go to the pool.”

Harry apparently accepts his lack of explanation. “I didn’t wake you up, I hope? I forgot how late you slept.”

Zayn shrugs. “What time is it?”

“So you haven’t changed.” Harry grins, and sets down a pan on the table before he lies down on the lounger. He looks good, Zayn sees, almost abstractly. He’d noticed yesterday too. He’d been pretty as a boy, and it’s matured into a handsome man, still rock star charming with pink lips and long hair and the look of luxury in every bone, even though he’s only in jeans and a t-shirt today. Maybe they’re designer, Zayn doesn’t know. He probably would have, once. “It’s about nine.”

“Oh.” He’d been working out longer than he realized. Zayn sits down on the other lounger, runs his hand over Rhino’s head when he flops it onto Zayn’s knee. “Don’t you have, like, rehearsal or summat?”

“I’ve got an interview in a bit,” Harry agrees. “It’s crazy for me right now, album promo season and a movie coming out in a few months, so it’s all hitting at once. And there’s an ad spot I’m doing, and I need to meet with some designers, and I have a song I want to finish, and there are rehearsals. Mainly the promo, though. Even though you ruined our best song, so.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” There’s no more mirth in Harry’s tone, and he’s staring at Zayn, like he had all of yesterday, like he can see through him. He doesn’t, of course. If he saw through Zayn he’d run away in horror.

“I mean,” Harry goes on, after a beat, “We’ll have to redo all our setlist and everything. You’re hell on paperwork even when you’re not in the band, Zayn.” He smiles, his easy smile, inviting Zayn in on the joke. Zayn smiles back, because he can’t not. He’s never been able to say no to Harry. Apparently becoming a monster hasn’t changed that. _We’ll make a predator of you yet, pretty boy_. Slade had. Slade and Ivo and Fyers and too many men dead.

“So what are you up to? Following up on your platinum album?” Harry keeps going. It’s like he gets that Zayn doesn’t know how to respond, doesn’t remember how. He never used to be this talkative, but maybe this is how he was in interviews, with people he didn’t know—he’s pouring on the charm. Even Zayn can remember how that felt, when Harry Styles fixed his considerable attention on you.

“No.” I’m hunting, he doesn’t say. I’m figuring out how to change the world.

“Really?” That does seem to surprise Harry, his eyes widening. “No music?”

_Singing’ll just let people know you’re alive_ , Slade’s voice says in his head, and Zayn winces. _A good voice goes quiet just as fast with a bullet to the chest._

“No.”

“Oh.”

Harry has that look, the one Zayn knows too well goes too quickly to pity. Zayn doesn’t want his fucking pity. He doesn’t want anyone’s pity. He doesn’t want Harry to know he’s broken. “These for me?” he asks, gesturing at the pan.

“Yeah!” Harry perks up, the confused look disappearing. “Got to feed you up. You’re too skinny.”

“That’s what my mum said.”

“It’s true.” Harry’s gaze flicks over his body again. “I’m good at it. I used to be a baker, you know.”

Zayn snorts, and then the surprise makes him grin more. “That I remember.”

“Yeah?” Harry gives a self-satisfied grin. “This is great, you’ve probably forgotten all my jokes. I can try them on you again.”

“I don’t think I want to hear them again,” Zayn retorts.

“Heeey,” Harry draws his lips together, pouts. “I’d forgotten how mean you are.”

Zayn shrugs. Harry doesn’t know the half of it. Harry never should know, the things you have to do to survive. Zayn isn’t mean, not always. But he’s cruel. He learned that, on the island with a bow in his hand. _Being cruel means you aren’t weak. Not being weak means you don’t get eaten. Do you want to get eaten, pretty boy?_

“I also came to warn you.” Harry doesn’t ask about his silence. It’s nice. His family had always asked, had pushed and asked. Harry lets him be. “Louis’s got a plan for a party tomorrow night, a welcome home for you sort of thing. I think he just assumed you wouldn’t have anything to do.”

Zayn nods. A party. It’s a nice thought of Louis. He doesn’t know whom Louis’s planning to invite, but people have always wanted to come to One Direction’s parties. And he assumes he’s probably a circus attraction, now.

“Is that okay? If it’s…” Harry tilts his head, considering. “Too much, I can tell him to cancel.”

“It’s fine.” Better to get it out of the way.

Harry hums an assent, then tips his head back. He looks almost exactly like the image Zayn’d carried with him for years, the memory of him that had been everything that wasn’t the island. It’s almost off-putting to see him now, to see the emblem come to life.

Zayn leans back in his own chair. He knows there’s a connection between the names, there has to be. Charles gave his life for it. He just needs to find it. He needs to talk to one of them, that’s the only answer. The most spooked one. A bit of intimidation goes a long way.

“Fuck!” Zayn snaps to attention at Harry’s exclamation. His bow’s downstairs, but he’s got knives in the kitchen. The pool skimmer could be a staff. He can get Harry behind him if he rolls out— “Is that a roach?”

Zayn glances down. There’s a cockroach skittering around, probably the remnants of a house left too long empty. He watches, waits until it gets close enough, then crushes it under his palm.

When he straightens again, Harry’s staring at him. “You used to scream at spiders. You made Liam kill them.”

Zayn shrugs, and wipes his hand on the ground. “When’s your interview?”

He doesn’t mean it to kick Harry out, but he clearly takes it as such, getting to his feet. “Soon enough. Eat your banana bread.” Harry points to the pan, his face set sternly. In another life, Zayn would think it was adorable.

“Thanks for stopping by.” Zayn stands up too. Harry doesn’t talk again, as they walk back through the house, Rhino trotting along next to them, until they get to the door and Harry turns back to him. His head’s tilted again, but Zayn doesn’t know what’s behind it.

“I…” he trails off, then shakes his head. “Are you okay?”

For once, the memory it brings back isn’t of violence of pain, but of youth and innocence, and Zayn chuckles for it.

It takes Harry a beat, then he grins, shakes out his hair. “But are you?” he presses.

Zayn sobers, shrugs again. There’s no answer to that, he thinks. “Depends what you mean by okay,” he replies, and Harry at least seems to get that’s the only answer he can give.

\---

_The office is opulent, richly traditional. The man at the big oak desk pushes the glasses up his nose, flips through the papers faster. He signs off on a few, sighs, and looks at the grandfather clock. It’s late, almost midnight._

_He glances at a picture on the desk next to the plaque with his name declaring him CEO, MarbeX. A woman with carefully dyed blonde hair and a perfect tan smiles at him out of the picture, a boy who resembles them both in her arms. Then he pulls out his phone, and with another sidelong, guilty look at the picture, types out a text._

_The lights flicker, and he looks around, perturbed. His phone buzzes, and he smiles as he sees the reply, runs a hand through his hair._

_The lights flicker again—then go off._

_“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he groans, and reaches for the phone._

_An arrow sprouts in the wood next to the phone, gouging into it, and he jumps, swears, and looks around._

_Out of the darkness floats a man, or the shape of a man, in dark green leather with a hood pulled over his face. A bow is drawn, and the arrow is pointed directly at the man’s heart._

_He starts to his feet, and the bow jerks._

_“Don’t kill me!” he yelps, falling back, his hands raised._

_The hooded man takes a step forward, the bow unwavering._

_“I’ve got money, I’ll give you whatever you want!” the man stammers, scooting backwards in his chair. “Please!”_

_The hooded man stops, but not as if prompted by the man’s words. “Henry Powell.” His voice is rough and low, an indistinguishable accent in it, slightly foreign. Henry’s not surprised. “Do you have a confession?”_

_“What? What do you want?” Slowly, he tries to inch in his towards his phone; another arrow strikes the wood there._

_“The truth,” comes the voice again. “The whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”_

_“Yes, whatever! Ask me anything!”_

_“What did you have to do with Charles Caldwell?”_

_Henry starts, his eyes wide. “How do you know about him?”_

_“What!” The bow moves sharply, and Henry falls back._

_“I didn’t do anything! He was just a business associate. We give to the same charities sometimes! That’s all!”_

_“And is that the truth!”_

_“Yes!” Henry’s nearly crying now. “That’s it! He’s dead, what does it matter?”_

_“For your sake, I hope it’s nothing,” the hooded man says. Then there’s an arrow next to Henry’s head and Henry screams and the hooded man is gone, somehow, into the darkness._

_For a moment Henry just sits there, his hands shaking against the arms of his chair. Then he scrambles forward, grabs his phone, and runs out of the room._


	3. Chapter 2

Louis shows up at eight, ringing the doorbell by pressing his hand on it and not letting up until Zayn gets there. It makes Zayn smile, almost—how he hasn’t changed.

“I know Harry warned you, you don’t have an excuse,” Louis announces, walking in without a hello. Zayn steps back so he can. “Why aren’t you dressed?”

“Don’t have anything to wear.”

“Bullshit.” Louis scoffs. “You always have shit to wear. First thing you probably did, bought all the new styles. Where’s your closet?”

“Louis—”

“If I went to the trouble to throw you a party, you can look nice at it. Where is it?” Louis glares, and Zayn rolls his eyes and shows him to his room. He’d made the bed today, at least; he’s pretty sure Louis wouldn’t let it go without comment if he’d seen the blankets in a tangle on the floor, like they had been when he’d woken up that morning, sweating from nightmares.

As it is, Louis just glances around. “Haven’t had time to settle in?”

“Huh?”

“It’s neat.” Zayn follows his look. He supposes it is.

“Haven’t gotten much stuff, yet.”

“It’s weird.” Louis glances at him, then shakes his head. “Anyway. Clothes. Closet.”

Zayn gestures towards it, and Louis opens it. “Wow, you weren’t kidding. Didn’t you miss your fancy styles on the island?”

Zayn blinks.

“Bit busy trying not to die,” he replies, and Louis snorts.

“Fair. Okay, you do need to look good though. Liam got ahold of the guest list, added in some execs and all. Can’t look bad in front of them.”

“Louis—”

“I can’t have you looking bad in front of them. Make me look bad.” Louis lets out a breath. “Okay, here.” He throws a pair of ripped jeans and a black henley at Zayn. “Shower, dress. Do your hair. I know you’re usually fashionably late but you’re the guest of honor, bro. Can’t have that now.”

“Don’t you have a son to nag now?” Zayn mutters, but he obediently tugs off his shirt. Too used to taking orders now, he guesses. Or he doesn’t care. Doesn’t know what Louis is doing, or why. He’d hated Zayn. Now he’s throwing him a party? Zayn doesn’t know what he wants, what his angle is, but if there’s one thing the island confirmed, it’s that there’s always an angle.

“Freddie’s with his mum, so I have a night to get trashed and remember what it was like to be twenty-two.” Louis crosses his arms over his chest. “Go.”

Zayn goes. It’s almost like a dream, showering and pulling on clothes to go out while Louis waits in the other room. Like a memory almost forgotten.

He doesn’t have much hair product, but when he looks in the mirror his heart skips a beat. He looks—fuck, he looks like it could be five years ago, almost. His hair back in a ponytail, the Henley tight around his shoulders because he’s put on muscle since he last wore it. There’s no sign of the scars under the shirt, or of the fact that he’s a whole new person since the last time he looked in this mirror to go out for a night.

“It’s a good thing I’ve grown up and I’m not still jealous of your looks,” Louis remarks, when he comes back downstairs. He’s typing at his phone. Zayn gets a look at it before he puts it into his pocket; the lock screen is of a smiling blonde boy with Louis’s mischievous eyes. “Let’s go. Your friends await you.”

Zayn’s hand twitches against his leg. Friends.

“Lou.” He takes a breath. “Why are you doing this for me?”

“Because you need to be welcomed home in style,” Louis tells him, opening the door.

It’s not all of it. That’s not how Zayn’s world works, not anymore—people don’t do things unasked. Friendship doesn’t work like that. Friendship is Slade keeping him alive because it’s easier to survive with two; friendship is the arrow he’d put in Slade’s eye because it was better to die than let the mirakuru turn him into a monster. Friendship isn’t throwing a party for someone you hated, just because.

“Come on,” Louis urges. Zayn takes a deep breath as he looks outside—and goes.

There’s a car waiting for them, with someone in it—a pretty woman about their age, in a short black dress with a lot of buckles. She glances up from her phone when they get in, her eyebrows raised like she’s unimpressed.

“This is Nadia, my PA,” Louis nods at her. “Nadia, Zayn.”

“Hey.”

“Good to meet you,” she nods at Zayn, then looks back down at her phone, her fingers moving fast.

“Don’t mind her, she’s anti-social. I only keep her around because she keeps me in video games,” Louis says, and Nadia gives him the finger without looking up. Louis’s smile back at her is fond, and he doesn’t retort, just flicks the TV from images of the latest ISIS bombing in Jordan to a Colt’s game, then leans back in the seat, his eyes sharp on Zayn.

Zayn watches him back. He’s changed, Zayn thinks. Settled, maybe. The bristling energy he remembers is gone, replaced by confidence he wears well.

“Like what you see?” Louis demands, smirking at him.

Zayn shrugs. Louis’s attractive. Always has been. But it was never him that had found his way into Zayn’s fantasies, even when Zayn had known that he shouldn’t think of a bandmate like that.

“If you want to get laid tonight, I’m sure you can. Not that you’ve ever had trouble with that.” Louis chuckles. Nadia snorts. “But I bet after five years you’re tired of your hand. We can work on that.”

Zayn closes his eyes. He thinks of Shado, and the sadness in her eyes. How desperate it had been, both of them desperate for human contact after too long alone. Of Harry, and the things he hadn’t let himself think about for years.

“No,” he says, and shakes his head. “I don’t…”

“Whatever works, bro.” Louis shrugs, then leans forward to dig for a bottle of whiskey. “Pre-game? I’m feeling like a teenager.”

The alcohol burns, going down, crisp and warm. Louis pours another for himself, but Zayn shakes his head, and watches the lights of the city go by. Somewhere out there, something horrible is happening, or will happen. And he’s going to a party.

\---

The party appears to have already started when they pull up, lights flashing inside. Louis hustles him out of the car and in, past security, as Nadia follows, her heels clicking on the concrete.

“No mobs?” he asks.

Louis shakes his head. “It’s not like that anymore, for the most part. Less stalking. Kind of nice, really. Lets Fred grow up right.” The doorman opens the door.

The noise hits Zayn like a rush, the bass pounding, so many people talking. It sounds like missile fire, like that roar, and Zayn curls his hand into a fist to stop it from shaking. He used to be able to be here like the back of his hand. No one is trying to kill him here. No one has to see the cracks in him.

“Zayn!” Liam appears next to him, grinning. He’s flushed, red; probably already a little drunk. He tugs a woman behind him, tall and stately, her dark hair tied up into a bun. “This is Diana, my wife.”

“Diana?” Zayn asks, raising an eyebrow. Liam and Diana both laugh.

“Bad coincidence,” she says, holding out a hand for him to shake. He takes it. Her grip is firm, confident. “Gives him something to sing to me, though.”

“Like I need one song to sing to you,” Liam tells her, leaning in to press a kiss to her hair. His other arm goes easily around her waist. “You’ve gotten plenty of songs about you.”

“Stop.” She blushes, bats at him playfully.

“Never.” Liam grins at her, as Louis gags next to him.

“I’ll get a drink, let you boys play.” She disentangles herself from Liam, gives Zayn a warm but cautious look. “Nice to meet you, Zayn. Only time I’ve seen Liam as happy as when he heard you were alive was on our wedding day.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Zayn tells her, and she nods and leaves.

“It is,” Liam informs him. “Come on, want a drink? Want anything?”

“Whose party is it?” Louis complains, falling into step with them.

“Who actually did the work?” Liam retorts. “Oh, Tom! Have you met Zayn?” He taps a man on the shoulder, older with salt and pepper hair, but not tense like he feels out of place.

The man steps back, opening up the circle. “I haven’t, but I’ve heard plenty. You’re big news, now.”

Zayn shrugs. They’re all looking at him, Tom and the men he was talking to, and he feels on display again, like he’s standing in the center of a circle of soldier trying to convince them he’s one of them before they shoot him.

“He’s always been big news,” Liam teases, nudging him with an elbow. “We didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“We were just talking about the elections,” Tom informs him. The man next to him huffs out a breath.

“I’m telling you, there’s no way Trump will win. He didn’t win in 2016, Hilary’s been popular, and third party candidates don’t have a chance. He’s just embarrassing himself this time.”

“Hilary’s been shit on foreign policy,” a woman points out. “What is she doing to protect us? ISIS is still a threat. That bombing in London…we could very well be next, if we aren’t careful.”

“That bombing was a fluke. Interment’s a ridiculous idea,” the second man scoffs. “What, are we in World War Two? Rounding up Muslims, honestly.”

“It would limit the threat,” the woman says, “I just—”

“This is a party!” Liam interrupts. “No politics, don’t you know manners? Zayn, this is Tom Carowitz, Christian Parker, and Genevieve Coleman, I’ve worked with all of them. You wouldn’t have met them before…”

“No,” Zayn agrees, looking at them. He thinks he’s forgotten small talk, if he ever knew it. “Nice to meet you.”

Genevieve scans him, something coolly accessing in her gaze. “You’re just as handsome your album promo made you out to be. Do you have plans? My agency—”

“No work either!” Louis protests, and leads Zayn away. He and Liam stay flanking Zayn as they talk to more people, some that Zayn knew, more he didn’t. He’s not sure what all of them are doing here, honestly. They don’t know him. They don’t want to welcome him back.

Finally, he looks at Liam. “Why am I talking to all of these people?”

Liam has the grace to flush. Zayn knew there was another motive, there always is. “They’re good people for you to know. You know. When you get back to business. I know you have plenty of contacts, but they’re out of date; you can make new ones here.”

Zayn waits, but that’s all. It’s sweet, he thinks. Liam in all his officiousness helpfulness. “I’m not going to.”

“What?” Liam demands, looking more horrified than the statement deserves. “You went platinum, Zayn! You’ve got to get back in! You promised me a remix.”

 _Singing isn’t going to keep you alive, pretty boy_.

“Anyway,” Louis interrupts, “This is a party, Li. Not a place to make connections. Come on, Zayn, you’re not drunk enough.”

Liam presses his lips together, but he lets it go, let Louis lead him away, towards the bar.

They find Niall and Harry there, laughing as they toss back a shot of something with a small brunette woman. She’s clearly with Harry, it’s written all over how she’s positioned next to him, and Zayn…he wonders if he should feel this, the twist of unease. Of jealousy, maybe. It had always been there before, when Harry was with a woman, no matter how unjustified it had been. But he doesn’t have a right to it now—didn’t then—and he doesn’t even know if it’s a remnant of the boy he’d been, before those sort of feelings got burned out of him. Before it became far too dangerous to feel anything like that. Slade made that clear enough, what jealousy could lead you to. An arrow in an eye and drugged rage at your friend. _It’s all your fault!_

“Hazza!” Liam throws an arm around Harry.

“Hey, Liam.” Harry laughs, lets Liam squeeze him tight before letting him go, then he turns to Zayn. The lights are bright, flashing, and it obscures the look in his eyes, but his gaze lingers, like he’s drinking Zayn in. “Zayn.”

“He needs a drink,” Niall announces, turning to the bartender. “None of the shit vodka Harry’s been ordering, either. The good stuff.”

“Hey,” Harry complains. He’s still looking at Zayn. No one’s looked at him like that for years—people have studied him, have tried to see to his heart, but there’s something different about Harry, in the flashing light and pounding bass. Zayn’s hand is steady as he takes his drink from the bartender, but it’s a conscious steadiness, the way he holds his bow. He’s calm. He has to be.

“Harry.” Niall mutters it quietly; five years ago Zayn might not have been able to make it out. “Introduce her.”

“Oh. Sorry.” He gives the girl at this side an apologetic smile. “Zayn, this is Leah. Leah, Zayn.”

“Nice to meet you.” He holds out the hand not holding his drink. Steady. He’s steady. The lights throw shadows over her pretty face, rounded cheeks and generous lips. She’s cute, not the model pretty Harry usually went for. That probably means something.

“You too.” Her handshake is firm too, stronger than he would have expected. She pauses, then her lips curve into a mischievous smile. “I’m actually kind of freaking out. I was always a Zayn girl.”

“Gonna stand for that?” Louis asks Harry.

Harry shrugs, takes a sip of the beer that appeared in his hand sometime. “She told me that straight up.”

“He said he was too,” Leah jokes, and Zayn raises his eyebrows as he looks at Harry.

Harry grins at him, dimpling and distracting. “Weren’t we all?”

“Fuck you, Niall’s my favorite,” Louis retorts. “Remember how to dance, Zayn?”

“Did I ever know?” Zayn asks, but he lets Louis lead him away. He doesn’t…it’s weird. Not with Harry, because he’d sat with Harry for an hour, and it had been easy. But Leah is an unknown. He doesn’t like unknowns. They’re inevitably threats.

The lights keep flashing, bright and regular, the bass thumping and Zayn knows he doesn’t remember how to move but he lets Louis and Liam think he’s trying, swaying a little as they laugh and get progressively drunker. He doesn’t drink much; his tolerance is shit. Something’s weird here. Something’s off, he knows something. Someone is here.

There are more people on the dance floor than Zayn knows. Faces, so many faces, all shadowed, and they swirl around him until he can’t differentiate between them anymore, like a fight, body and body and body. Everything moves, and then he’s looking at a man he doesn’t know, that’s off, he’s off, standing on the edge of the room watching everything, his face half hidden and cold, cold like Ivo was cold when he slit Shado’s throat, watching like everyone’s his prey. If Zayn could think he’d focus on him, on how he’s watching like a predator, but then everything moves and the man’s gone, and it’s just more faces he doesn’t know, more bodies against him, more people who could hurt him. He doesn’t know where Louis found all these people, or maybe he was just the excuse for the party, or maybe he did know these people once. Maybe this would have been fun once. Before the lights flashing are gunshots and its hot, too hot and humid, like days on the island, and drums beat out a ratatat and—

There’s a hand on Zayn’s shoulder and he reacts, to the gunfire and the heat and the look in that man’s eyes and someone’s attacking. He blocks it, grabs their wrist and twists and then their arm’s behind their back and Zayn has their other arm in his, held tight, he needs a knife or his bow or—

“Zayn!”

Zayn blinks. And then fuck, shit, hell, there are confused blue eyes looking at him, Niall’s arms pinned behind him and Louis’s looking at him like he’s insane and over his shoulder Harry’s staring like he’s the monster he is.

“Fuck, I’m sorry. I—” Zayn shakes his head, lets go of Niall, backs up with his hands up. His hands are shaking now—he needs his bow, needs to run, needs to move, needs to not be here with people looking at him like violence is unexpected needs to get away from the bullets and the lights and the heat—

It’s easy enough to melt into the crowd, has too much practice, they shouldn’t find him they won’t he can get away they won’t get him—

_The leaves hit his face as he runs, and he just has to get to the ridge the soldiers don’t know the area they won’t dodge the landmines he has traps the branches grab at him and he pushes through—_

Then he’s outside, in an alley, and he collapses back against the wall. It’s not as dirty as it could be, probably more a smoker’s haven than anything, but it’s thankfully empty. Zayn presses back against the cold concrete of the club, takes a deep breath. He’s okay. The air is cooler, filled with LA smog. There are no bullets. No one knows, here.

He sinks down so he’s sitting, his knees brought to his chest. Why’d he even think he could be near people? He’d gotten away from his sisters so he wouldn’t hurt them, now he was hurting Niall. He shouldn’t do this. He shouldn’t be here. He should be doing what he meant to, what he was meant to. It was why he survived, why he’d made it back off the island. To change things.

A door opens, and Zayn flinches, bolting to his feet. His fist is clenched at his side.

“Hey.” Harry stumbles out. He looks much drunker than the last time Zayn had seen him. “Just wanted to check. If you were okay.”

Zayn snorts. Harry shrugs, picking his way across the alley. He looks out of place here, in the dirt and grit, in pants as tight as when Zayn left, his shirt still gaping open at his chest, his hair falling in styled curls to his shoulders. He’s meant to be in there, in the bright lights and glamor. Not with Zayn in this back alley, in the shadows that Zayn’s learned.

“Louis meant well,” Harry goes on. He’s a bit louder than usual. Drunk, Zayn catalogs. He makes a face at the dirt on the wall, but leans against it anyway.

“I know.” Zayn takes a long breath. He does. Louis meant well. He does believe that, he thinks. But intentions don’t count for much. “I just…”

“Needed a smoke?” Harry suggests.

Zayn shakes his head. “Not anymore.” Kicking that addiction had made the first few weeks even worse, shaking with so many needs. But it’s as good an explanation as any. Better than how it felt like a battlefield in there, than how Zayn’s hand is twitching with the need for his bow.

Harry nods, like he understands. He doesn’t, Zayn knows. He can’t. No one can, not here.

At least Harry doesn’t say anything else, just leans against the wall, lets Zayn breathe. The air tastes different here, the smog and gas. Everything’s different here. So crowded and bright and hot and he can’t—he can’t _think_. He’s missing something.

“Leah seems nice.” It’s his voice, to his surprise. “Shouldn’t you be in with her?”

“She can take care of herself.” Harry shrugs, tucks a lock of hair behind his ear.

“And I can’t?” Zayn could almost laugh.

“I wasn’t sure. You ran out of there.”

“She’s your girlfriend.”

Harry blinks, looks at Zayn. He thinks there’s meaning in that look, a meaning that speaks of years curled up together on tour buses, of candy thongs and lingering hands and a voicemail gone unanswered. But he doesn’t know more than that. He doesn’t know this Harry. And Harry definitely doesn’t know him.

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“Do you love her?” A distraction. _An emotional attack works just as well as the physical_. Slade’s voice. He’d found that out too well, in the end. Love is a weakness. Love can drive you mad.

Harry laughs, the mirthless one that Zayn remembers from stress and too much tension. His finger’s brushing Zayn’s. “Hasn’t anyone told you? I don’t fall in love.” He’s still looking at Zayn, his nostrils flaring just a bit. _Lie. Always know a lie. You don’t have to call them on it, but know their weakness, pretty boy._

“Love’s overrated.” Love and honor and art and all those things Zayn had thought mattered once. Truth, whatever that was. Now he knows. It’s survival. Survival is what matters. Survival, and a list that means more than he can figure out. A list—

It hits him. Genevieve. Genevieve Coleman. She’s on the list.

“I’ve got to go.” Zayn pushes off the wall. She was a bit drunk, she’ll be open to suggestion. To intimidation. “I can’t…tell Louis thanks, for me?”

“Of course.” Harry’s head tilts. “See you, Zayn.”

Zayn nods. He doesn’t go back inside. If he hurries, he can get back, get his suit, and get back by the time Genevieve leaves. So he turns on his heels, and jogs back into the night.

\---

Harry’s drunk. He hadn’t planned to be very drunk, had wanted to just have a nice night out celebrating Zayn’s resurrection, but then…then Zayn. And wasn’t that just the moral of the last five years.

So he’s drunk, and leaning maybe more than he should on Leah, as they exit the club. It’s hours after Zayn had left, after he’d melted away like he was just a dream. Harry’s keeping his hand tight around Leah. He feels bad, a bit. He likes her. He does. She’s funny and sweet. But then there was Zayn, asking if he’d ever been in love. Zayn with his bright panicked eyes, with the tension in his shoulders as he looked around the room. Zayn with his tattoos and face, and the twist in Harry’s stomach, just as potent now as it was six years ago, before he realized all that it could mean. Zayn, and the hole slowly knitting itself together in his heart, and the emptiness he had left.

“Let’s get you home,” Leah laughs, as he stumbles. “You’re drunk.”

“Let’s get you home,” he retorts, and tugs her in close. She’s lovely. She’s nice and lovely and make him laugh and won’t tear him apart if he loses her. “We’ve got things to do tonight.”

She giggles, and he smirks, slow and knowing, the one that always works. “Great, let’s catch a cab.”

“Let’s walk.” Harry spins her away from her in a mock swing-dancing move. “I want to walk, get some air. It’ll be romantic.”

“Do you promise you won’t pass out?” she asks, raising her eyebrows, and Harry crosses his fingers over his chest.

“Swear it.”

“Fine then.” She interlaces their fingers, squeezing just a bit.

It’s not the nicest walk, Harry can admit. It’s a more industrial part of town, and everything’s a little abandoned and a little dark and a little dirty, far away from Rodeo Drive and all. But the air is crisp, and it’s sobering Harry up. Walking through LA with a lovely girlfriend. This is the dream, this is what he should want. Grown up stuff. Settling down.

Now he’s holding Leah’s hand, and thinking of Zayn’s face, as he looked into the sky and said love was overrated. Zayn had always been the most romantic of all of them—quickest to fall in love, maybe quick to fall out of it too. Reckless with his heart in so many ways, when Harry held his close, afraid of letting it go. He was the one who’d make huge romantic statements, who’d rent out a funfair park or declare everything on twitter. Who would never hesitate to tell his friends he loved them, who’d always been the first to hug or kiss or cuddle. And now he thinks love is overrated, with a bite to his voice that makes Harry wonder.

“Harry.” Leah tugs on his arm. Right, his girlfriend, or his something. “Harry, I think someone’s following us.”

Harry glances around. They’re not in that bad a part of town. They can still hear the party behind them. “Don’t worry, I’m big and strong,” he jokes, “I’ll protect you.” She giggles, but she still glances around nervously.

“No, I’m serious. I hear footsteps.”

Leah’s always been cautious—it’s why this is one of the first times he went out with her publicly. It keeps Harry from being reckless, like he can be sometimes, but Harry wants to be reckless tonight. He wants to walk, to just have a nice walk in the moonlight with his girlfriend, and not think about Zayn in the alley, or Zayn in the club with the watchful eyes like he didn’t understand any of it anymore, or Zayn in his tight jeans and tight shirt with all his new muscles and still beautiful face.

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” Harry assures Leah. In the dark, hopefully she doesn’t catch his rolled eyes. “We’re just two people taking a stroll. No one would bother—”

It’s his life, Harry supposes, that it’s at that moment that the man emerges from the shadows. He’s big, in a hoodie with a Lakers emblem on it, but more pertinently he’s looming menacingly.

“Stop,” he growls. Harry freezes. Leah squeaks, tucking herself closer. “Step away from each other.”

Harry’s too drunk for this. Slowly, he holds out his hands, gives his best smile. “Hey, mate. It’s fine. I’ve got plenty of money in my wallet.”

“Step away from each other,” the man repeats, and his hand emerges from his pocket and holy shit, that’s a gun. Harry stumbles backwards. A gun. He’s never really seen a gun before, not pointed at him. Well it’s not pointed at him it’s waving around between them, but shit, he’s—

“Harry,” Leah mutters, squeezing his hand. “I—”

“Away!” The man repeats. “You need to get away from him!”

“Hey, we can—” Harry starts, then suddenly there’s an arrow in the guy’s arm and he’s screaming in pain and the gun’s on the ground.

Harry looks around instinctively, clutching at Leah’s hand. They should run, he knows, but what is happening? He doesn’t know, doesn’t get it, doesn’t know where to go.

The screaming stops. The man’s straightening, and he looks mad now, his eyes narrowed. “Fuck you!” he yells, into the night. “Fucking Robin Hood isn’t gonna stop my payday!”

He starts forward—and Harry backpedals, Leah dragging him with her as she darts backwards, but Harry’s stumbling because he’s drunk and him and he’s not sure what’s happening and—

It seems like he appears from nowhere, the way the man hits the ground, tucking and rolling and on his feet between Harry and the attacker. He doesn’t even breathe before he launches forward, and the attacker yells and throws a punch but the new person’s moving first, blocking the punch with his forearm and lashing out himself. It’s over in seconds, or maybe it’s hours Harry doesn’t even know, but then the attackers on the ground with an arrow in his thigh and their defender’s standing over him.

It’s the first time Harry gets a proper look at him, and even then it doesn’t feel proper. He’s blending into the shadows it feels like, his dark green leather mixing with it until there’s nothing for Harry to see other than a hint of a sharp chin, broad shoulders, narrow waist, and the bow over his shoulder. The hood hides his face, drawn low.

“That’s the guy from the news!” Leah murmurs, still tugging on Harry’s hand. “Harry, he’s dangerous, we have to go!”

But he’s not. Or maybe he is, but maybe Harry’s just too drunk, because he doesn’t feel threatened. He’s heard about the man of course, the man in the hood who’s been terrorizing people, threatening them at arrowpoint for no reason, but Harry’s heard the reports about him saving people too. Like he saved them. And he’s not moving now, just looking at them, his chin raised, his bow clutched in one hand.

“Thank you,” Harry says. It’s only polite, he figures. Leah makes a sound that he doesn’t think is approving.

“Is he dead?” she asks. It’s almost a demand, but too quiet.

“He’s not dead.” The voice is rough, accentless—probably faked, in Harry’s fairly expert opinion on voices. It still sends a shiver through Harry’s spine, though that could be adrenaline. “Call 911, if you’d like. Then get in a cab.”

“Who are you?” Harry asks. He gives his most disarming smile, because this is sort of amazing. Louis’s never going to believe him, that he met the vigilante. And if he focuses on that he’s not going to focus on the panic because he almost just died. Compartmentalizing is a beautiful thing, he’s discovered.

The man in the hood shakes his head. “You shouldn’t be walking alone here.” In one smooth motion, the bow is on his back. There’s enough light for Harry to see how tight the leather on his arms is, hugging the muscle there. “Go home.”

“We have to wait for the ambulance, give a statement,” Leah puts in. “What are we going to say?”

“Whatever you’d like.” The man nods, once. “Stay safe.”

Then he’s gone, like magic, like the shadows have eaten him alive, and it’s just Harry and Leah and an unconscious body.

“Holy shit.” Leah’s phone’s slack in her hand—she must have called 911.

Harry’s still staring at where the man in the hood disappeared. It’s probably the adrenaline, he decides. That’s why he’s thinking hard about the way the leather wrapped around his thighs.

“Well.” He turns back to Leah, shrugs. She’s shaking, and he can fake calm enough for to get her home. “That was new.”

\---

Zayn flips on the TV in the basement. It breaks up the noise of the police scanner easily enough, and it’s a better way to catch up passively on everything that’s happened. And it’s not something he’d ever thought would be a problem, but it’s too quiet in the house. Even with Rhino, Zayn…he wasn’t used to the city noise, but he’s used to the island, and it’s never quiet there. Even when it was just him, there was the wind, the animals, the fire crackling. Not just his footsteps in the house.

He picks up his bow, runs a hand over it, for comfort. For assurance. He knows that, at least. Maybe not parties, not people, not anymore—but he knows his bow. Knows his mission. Or, maybe. He has to figure it out.

The list is posted on the wall. He had vague ideas of making some sort of intense diagram whiteboard, like in all the crime shows he used to watch, but he’s not Batman. He doesn’t even have anywhere to start. No one’s known anything. Genevieve Coleman was a bust last night, though getting Harry away from the mugger while he’d been waiting for her to leave had made the expedition worth it, he supposes. But she hadn’t said anything, and he doesn’t think she was lying. Just like all the other people on the list. They all seem to know Charles, but they don’t…there’s no more than that.

He grabs an arrow, and spins and shoots. It quivers in the eye of the dummy, and Zayn lets out a breath. Now he just needs to know who that dummy is. Needs to find a place to start.

The sound of his name makes him jump and spin, his bow drawn—but then he lets the arrow fall when he realizes it’s just the TV. It’s some interview, some late night show with a host Zayn doesn’t recognize anymore, but the boys are sitting on a couch, laughing with the host. They all fit on the couch. He remembers that being bittersweet, once.

“It’s good to have him back, of course,” Liam’s answering. “A shock, but—we can’t express how amazing it is.”

“Bit of a miracle, it feels like,” Niall adds, and Louis nods. Harry’s got a half-smile on, one Zayn can’t read. It’s not like they say anything important in interviews anyway.

“And I heard you had your own close shave a few nights ago,” the host says to Harry, who perks up, brushing his hair out of his face. “Is it true you met the hooded vigilante?”

“I don’t know if it’s that one,” Harry says, slowly. Zayn grabs the remote to turn it up. The other boys are looking at Harry with interest, and the host has his eyebrows raised. “But yeah. A friend and I were walking back—” Niall turns a laugh into a cough into the back of his hand, “From Zayn’s welcome home party, actually, and we got into a bit of trouble. The vigilante came, scared them off.”

“I heard it was a bit more than scared,” The host presses. Liam’s hand is on Harry’s thigh, a comforting sort of pressure, Zayn thinks. “Wasn’t the mugger out cold?”

“Well, yes,” Harry admits. “But the vigilante tried to scare him away, first.” He gives another disarming smile. “So it was more self-defense. Or, defense of me.”

“But it was proper terrifying, right?” Louis asks, turning so he can look at Harry. “Weren’t you afraid he was going to ask you for money too, or something? Or hurt you?”

Harry’s eyes narrow. Zayn tilts his head. He’d never thought of that. Never thought of any of this. Why would he? He doesn’t need money. He doesn’t need people to like him, to not be afraid of him. He needs justice.

“No,” Harry replies, slowly. “No, he was saving us from—I was scared of the mugger. He was…” he trails off. “I wasn’t scared,” Harry finishes. “Or, I was scared. But it was exciting!” He smirks. “Now ask the part you really want to know.”

The host smiles easily. “Okay. What’d he look like?”

“My memory of it is a bit…hazy,” Harry replies, with a crooked grin. “But there was a lot of leather involved.”

“Kinky,” Louis mutters, and Harry snorts out a laugh.

Zayn switches the channel as the interview goes on, about their new album and the shows they’re doing in LA to promote it and Harry’s new movie or something. It settles on a news report about more bombings in Syria, ISIS they think, and how Hilary is trying to deal with it. Zayn watches that for a minute, then turns it off completely. He thought everything would be better, once he was off the island. He should have known better. The world’s still the world, and he knows now how bad that can be.

He puts the bow back into the trunk, then goes to the salmon ladder, jumps up to grab the bar. The clang of metal on metal fills the room, and there’s a noise he recognizes.

\---

It’s a bad idea. Harry decides that on the doorstep of the house, as there’s a barking in the house. This is a bad idea. It had seemed like a good idea this morning, when he thought of it; it had seemed like a good idea when he’d talked to Caroline about it. But now he realizes it’s a bad idea. It’s been five years, he doesn’t know what Zayn wants, what he likes.

But he does know that Zayn hasn’t left his house for days, since the party—or not for long, or with anyone. He knows that Zayn had looked lost at the party and he knows he doesn’t want Zayn to feel that. He knows he wants to spend more time with Zayn, because it’s been five years and now he’s…he’s here, he’s not just a voicemail. And maybe, if he spends enough time with Zayn, he’ll get up the courage to ask about that voicemail. To ask what Zayn would have said. To tell him he would have called back.

So he tucks his hair back behind his ear—maybe he should have pulled it back, but well, he also remembers how Zayn had used to tug at his hair when it was loose like this, how much he’d loved Harry’s curls. So Harry fusses a bit, then swallows, and rings the bell.

The barking comes immediately, Rhino’s familiar greeting, then the sound of his body hitting the door. Harry laughs, and waits.

It takes almost a minute, long enough Harry was wondering if Zayn wasn’t home, if something had happened—but then the door swings open.

Harry’s breath stops. He’s still not used to Zayn, here. With his sharp jawline and sweatpants low on his hips and messy dark hair and an old tank top straining against his chest. He’s so much like the boy Harry’d known, but he’s not a boy anymore, not even a little.

Harry doesn’t know how long he just looks, how long they look at each other, but then Rhino butts at Harry’s thigh and Harry leans down to greet him. He’d forgotten the intensity of Zayn in a room. How he filled all of Harry’s vision sometimes, expanding until Harry couldn’t think of anything else. How terrifying that had been, that he’d taken everything.

“Hey, boy,” Harry murmurs. He’s still not entirely a dog person, but he likes Rhino. Maybe some of that is because of those last five years, when Rhino’d felt like a last bit of Zayn, but even now the familiarity of him is nice.

Then he looks up. Zayn’s still looking at him, those hazel eyes narrowed a little, his head tilted like he’s trying to decipher anything. Like he’s confused. It’s barely noon, Harry realizes too late—he should have known. “Sorry, did I wake you up?”

“What? No.” Zayn runs a hand back through his hair. “No, I wasn’t…” he shakes his head, trailing off.

“Great.” Harry stands up. “I’m kidnapping you. Well. If you want to. No pressure.”

Zayn’s brows furrow, and his hands twitch against his side, like he wants to clutch at something. “What?”

“I thought you might want some company,” Harry explains. It sounds stupid when he says it like this. But it’s not. He’d read a bit, the articles Niall had sent them about PTSD, and he doesn’t want Zayn to be alone. “We can—we can hang out here, or you can come to mine, or I sort of set something up if we want to go somewhere.”

“Where?”

“Can it be a surprise?” There’s a pause. Harry grins, dimpling like he knows Zayn had always been weak for in the past. “Don’t you trust me?”

The next pause isn’t exactly flattering. “Zayn.”

“It’s not you.” Zayn scrubs his hand over his face again. “I don’t think I should be around people, Harry. Look what happened at the party.”

“Niall’s fine. He doesn’t blame you.” Harry decides not to mention what it had been like in the moment, how Zayn had moved before any of them had realized what was happening, Niall’s arm twisted in a single surge of violence that Harry hadn’t known Zayn was capable of. But that is not what Harry wants to focus on now. He shakes out his hair, lets his lower lip jut out a bit. “Haven’t you been alone enough?”

And now’s the real test, to see if he’s still Zayn. “And I need a distraction. Did you hear about what happened a few days ago, with the vigilante?” He doesn’t have to fake his shudder. It was a lot scarier in retrospect—not the vigilante so much as the mugger, as the way the gun had pointed at him. He could have died, right there. He hadn’t internalized it until the next day. He would have died. “I don’t…I don’t want to think about it.”

Zayn is still looking at him, a heavy gaze that’s new, that’s not something Harry remembers, that sends shivers over his body regardless. But then he nods, and Harry lets himself smile. He’s still Zayn. The important things are still there. “Okay.” He steps back, letting Harry in. “Let me just take a shower.”

“No hurry!” Harry calls, as Zayn disappears upstairs. Harry doesn’t follow him. Zayn was always sensitive about his space, and he doesn’t want to push, not now. Now he’s happy to just wait in the kitchen. He doesn’t want to poke around if Zayn doesn’t want him to.

Still, Harry opens the fridge, seeing if there’s a snack. There’s some basic foods there, but nothing really. Nothing of Zayn here. Like there isn’t much in the whole kitchen, in what parts of the living room he’d seen. It’s like all the sheets came off the furniture, but Zayn didn’t do anything more than that, even though Harry knows there were plenty of contractors in and out of the house recently. And that’s…Zayn’d always made a home. Whether it was his London house, or the tour bus, or even just the boys, he’d always been able to make a home, to carve out that space. But it’s not here. How long has it been since he had a home?

Harry’s distracted by the sound of boots on the floor, and he looks up as Zayn comes downstairs. He’s in loose, ripped jeans Harry thinks he remembers, and another tank top. His hair’s messy, unstyled and flat on his head, bit of water still dripping down his neck, down onto his chest, and Harry can’t quite help how his gaze follows the droplets, how he licks his lips with the uninvited image of licking the water from his skin.

“That was fast.”

Zayn shrugs. “I don’t have much to choose from.” It makes Harry smile. “What?”

“Nothing. Come on!” Harry herds Zayn out of the house as gently as he can, down into the Range Rover he’d parked at the curb. He kind of wanted to take out the convertible, but he has a feeling Zayn wouldn’t like to be exposed like that.

Harry steals looks at Zayn, as they drive. He’s different. Harry’d known he’d be different, of course he would be, but it’s…disconcerting. Almost as disconcerting as the places where it’s not different—where they can still sit in silence as they drive, Harry’s music on low, and Harry doesn’t feel the need to talk, to fill the space.

Harry doesn’t even think about the fact that his music’s on shuffle until the song shifts and it’s Zayn’s voice coming from the speakers, the crooning voice singing about summer love and late nights. It’s one of the few songs off of Zayn’s album that Harry could have on a normal playlist, that didn’t take him out at the knees, but now it feels weird. Maybe weirder than having his own music.

He steals a glance at Zayn. He’d learned early on to not show weakness in front of Zayn when he was in a teasing mood, like Louis, unless he really really didn’t want to deal with it, and this isn’t that serious. Maybe Zayn didn’t notice. Maybe Zayn will let it go. The old Zayn wouldn’t have—would have teased Harry to hell and back probably, singing it at Harry until Harry was swearing and shoving him away and trying not to blush because having Zayn sing love songs at him was always a little too much. But Harry doesn’t know how this Zayn will react. Maybe it’ll get him to laugh.

It doesn’t. Zayn’s looking at the speakers, his brow furrowed in something like confusion. Like he knows it’s him, but doesn’t recognize the song.

“It’s good,” Harry says, because he feels like he has to say something. “This, but the whole album too. It’s not even really my kind of music, but it’s good.”

“It sounds good,” Zayn agrees, listening to his own riffs. “Fuck. I barely even remember doing this.”

“You’ll need to,” Harry points out. “Probably you’ll need a vocal coach, just in case I know some people, I can refer you. Or I’m sure your manager—”

“I won’t.” Zayn reaches over, and the music switches to Fleetwood Mac. “I told you. I’m not doing that again.”

“What?” Harry doesn’t slam on the breaks as they get to a stoplight, but it feels like a close call. “Zayn, your album was huge. And only partly because of other circumstances. People will buy whatever else you put out just because of curiosity, even if you weren’t…you.” He waves a hand. Zayn knows what he means.

“I’m not going to,” Zayn repeats. He scrubs a hand over his face, and he looks so old, suddenly. Old and jaded and tired, like he had at the end, before he left. He’d seemed to have lost that look, in the months between March and September, or at least the paparazzi and magazine pictures had shown that. Harry’d hoped he had, for the past years; hoped he’d died happy and doing what he cared about. It hadn’t made anything better, but it had made things a tiny bit less bad. But now that look, or something like it, is back. “What’s the point?”

“To making music?” Harry asks, just to clarify. It’s not a sentence he’d ever thought he’d hear Zayn say. Hear any of them say, but almost Zayn most of all. They all loved the music for different reasons, but Zayn was the one who loved it for what it could do, for what he could do with it. To him it had always been supposed to have a point, to say something. “Do what you always wanted, right? To change things.”

“Music’s not how things change.” Zayn shakes his head, then turns it so he can look out the window. His profile’s as sharp as ever, something statue cold about it, and Harry swallows. It’s so not Zayn. Zayn was never cold, not really. Harry’d always loved that about him—how he might try to pretend to be cool and mysterious, but he’d always loved so hard. Cared so much. Been so passionate about everything he did, so intense, in a way Harry had never quite managed. And now…this.

But Harry doesn’t know what to say, when Zayn clearly doesn’t want to talk about it, so he doesn’t ask. Doesn’t ask what had happened to Zayn, that cut the heart out of him.

“Where are we going?” Zayn asks, after maybe five more minutes of silence, and Harry lets out a relieved breath. They’re almost there, there’s no point keeping it a surprise any long.

“Shopping!”

“What?”

“Well, I saw at the party, what you were wearing was pretty out of style. Not that you could ever look bad—” Understatement of the century—“But I thought you might want something a bit more fun? Your kind of fun, not mine,” Harry specifies, smoothing out his scarlet shirt with the bright green flowers on it. He can’t imagine of all things, Zayn’s style would have changed. “So I talked to a few people, got this together. It’ll be a bunch of designers, cool new street styles.” He grins at Zayn, hopeful. He’s trying. He just…he wants Zayn to smile again. He wants Zayn to seem happy again, like Harry hadn’t seen him for so long. He wants Zayn, in a way too twisted up for him to think about, but this will help. “Maybe make you look like you again, at least?”

Zayn blinks, long and slow, then his lips twitch. “You saying I’m too unfashionable to be seen with you, Styles?” he teases, and Harry lets out a louder laugh than is warranted. It feels good to hear Zayn tease again.

And it’s even better than that, Harry thinks, watching as Zayn wanders through the racks, as he touches each shirt and fabric gently, almost wonderingly, his face a little slack like it gets when he’s overwhelmed. He talks with the personal shopper who’s there, tries some things on. His back straightens a little with everything he puts on, even as his shoulders get a little looser as he asks about the designers, takes the ipad the shopper has so Zayn can flip through other things. Harry follows after him, gives his opinion when he’s asked (“I like the color!” “You would. I think it’s too much for me.” “Brings out your eyes, though.” “I’m not wearing anything with sparkles.”). But really he just watches, watches Zayn remembering he loves this.

They walk out hours later. Zayn has a bag in his hand, and a promise of many more delivered later, and that dead look is out of his eyes.

“Thanks,” he says, as they get back into the car. He’s smiling, when Harry looks over at him; smiling properly, with his eyes and his mouth and his nose wrinkling, the soft look in his eyes like he always had when he looked at Harry, the look Harry’d guarded like it was precious. The look he never thought he’d get again. “I didn’t know I needed this.”

“Don’t doubt retail therapy,” Harry replies, pulling back onto the road. Zayn smiled at him again, today. It’s been years since he felt those sort of butterflies in his stomach, but he remembers them so well.

\---

It’s really coincidence, Zayn’s there. That Zayn happens to be outside the club Harry, Louis, and Niall are at, perched on the rooftop, looking down. He’d just—he couldn’t sit in his basement anymore, couldn’t deal with just sitting there staring at a list that went nowhere, listening to the police talk about crimes on the scanner that he couldn’t get to in time. What’s the point of him? What’s the point of anything?

So he’d had to get out, had to roam the rooftops like they were the island hills. Like he can do something again, like his actions have meaning. It’s trite, but it makes him feel better, makes his blood sing just a bit, when his arrows pierce the shoulder of a thief sneaking away, leaving them cursing for the police to find. He’s doing something, at least.

He knew where the boys were going tonight. Niall’d texted him, with a laugh at the end and an open-ended question, and Harry’d mentioned it, when he’d stopped by in the morning like he’d taken to doing. They didn’t talk, not always; Harry’d just make Zayn breakfast, or take a walk with Rhino with Zayn, or they’d lie by the pool together. Another set of footsteps, to fill a house Zayn doesn’t know. Another heartbeat, when Zayn doesn’t remember how to make his beat. But Zayn hadn’t meant to end up here, he just…is. There’s nowhere else for him to go.

He’s out of sight of all the cameras, lurking on this rooftop, blending into the night. It’s easier here. Where no one can see him. Easier than down there, where he can see the three of them leave the club together. They aren’t stumbling, not like they might have years ago, but they laugh and Louis’s shoving at Niall. They used to think they’d grown up too fast—that they’d never been able to be boys, to fuck around without responsibility. But they’d been naïve, then. They didn’t know real responsibility. Zayn runs his hand over his bow, reflexive. They still don’t. They’ve never known what it’s like to want, to fear. No one here has, no one in that club. That’s why Zayn’s up here, watching the men he’d grown up with walking down the sidewalk. It’s closed on one side, so they head the other way.

They were at a small club, one of the “weird underground” ones Louis likes, apparently. Zayn could almost laugh. This isn’t underground. They don’t know underground, not like he does now. He rubs at the tattoo on his shoulder, the Bratva brand. But the club is out of the way. Zayn hops over the boundary between two buildings. His motorcycle’s a bit behind him, but he doesn’t think that’ll be a problem. The sun will be up soon, anyway. He’ll have to be Zayn Malik again. Have to slip into the skin he doesn’t remember.

Harry laughs at something Niall says, running a hand through his hair as he dimples. It’s the same smile he had five years ago. He shines just as brightly as five years ago, almost as brightly as the image Zayn had carried with him for five years. He—

The movement catches his eye. The men below him don’t notice, too busy talking and laughing, too sheltered to be wary, but Zayn lost that long ago, and there’s movement in the shadows. Three men, he thinks, his muscles tensing. One for each?

Zayn tugs his hood down, over his eyes. Harry hadn’t recognized him last time, but he doesn’t know if he can count on that. He shifts his hand on his bow, warming up his muscles. He’s not so stupid he’ll try to take on all three of these men if he’s wrong and they just happen to be hanging out in a dark alley, waiting for rich popstars to come by. But maybe he’s here for a reason. Out of long dead instinct, to watch out for his boys.

The men move all at once, synchronized, out of alleys on either side so the One Direction men are surrounded. Zayn hears Louis swear, hears Harry gasp, hears the sound Niall makes, the same one he’d used to make in small spaces—and he doesn’t think anymore.

He’s on the ground, and there’s an arrow in the leather jacket of the man closest to Louis, then Zayn’s bow is moving and it slams into the man near Harry’s head. He’s too surprised to block, drops, and Zayn keeps going, into the other man, who’s ready for him. He’s bold, ready with his fists, but Zayn’s been trained by the best and he’s needed this, needed to hit someone, to fight, to feel like he’s doing something, and he lashes out with all of that—his bow flashing through the air, singing with the same satisfaction hitting a note once had given him. He knocks that man back, then the man with the arrow in his jacket is back up, coming at Zayn from behind. He ducks, pivots, sweeps, and the first man falls again. The third one’s gone, he notes offhand, scampered away somewhere, and he can see the phone in Niall’s hand, but then that glimpse is gone because there’s a fist and he turns it aside, and his blood is singing in his veins. He feels alive, like he never has anywhere else, and the solid wood of his bow connects with a temple and that man’s down. Zayn’s up, away, draw, point—and there’s an arrow pointed at the last man’s eye.

“I don’t miss,” Zayn rumbles, in the voice he’d chosen.

The man’s hands go up. “Woah man! Money’s not good enough for this shit.”

“Money?” Zayn asks. Was this a ransom? Kidnap a member of One Direction so all the fans would pay? So their management would pay?

“Knew I should have taken the other job,” the man keeps going, almost to himself. He’s stepping backwards, and Zayn lets him. His arrow will still reach him. “These rich dudes always have hella security. Even an armored truck wouldn’t be like this. Arrows, man? Are you crazy?”

“Armored truck?” Zayn snaps. He hadn’t heard about that. But if there was a job with an armored truck—it had to be something.

The man tilts his head. “You’re awfully uninformed, for a hero. You have a name, tough guy?”

Zayn lets the arrow fly. He has another one on the string before the first lodges in the man’s shoulder, deeper than the first time. It must pierce the leather, because the man swears. “Fucking hell! Fine. It’s going down by the docks. There was just mutters, man! You know how it is. Word that someone wanted muscle. That’s all I know! Swear it.” He takes another step back.

“Go,” Zayn orders, and the man runs. It’s enough. He’s too scared to be back.

“Should you have just let him go?” comes a voice from behind him, and Zayn turns. He’s not surprised it’s Louis.

“Lou,” Harry mutters. They’re all staring at him, but Zayn doesn’t think he sees recognition in any of them. Just fear. And a smile from Harry, a little wobbly but sure. “Thank you. Again.”

“Are they dead?” Louis asks, pointing at the bodies, and Niall giggles nervously. Zayn glances at them. He hadn’t hit them that hard.

“No.” Zayn has places to be, apparently. He needs to get back to his motorcycle. What’s coming in on an armored truck? He hadn’t heard chatter about it. But first… “Are you hurt?”

“No.” Harry gives another one of those smiles. “Thanks to you.”

Louis rolls his eyes. “Stop flirting with the vigilante.”

“I’m just saying thank you!” Harry protests, but his gaze flicks over Zayn.

“Yeah, thank you for not killing us too,” Louis agrees.

Zayn doesn’t have time for them bickering. Doesn’t have time to think about what Harry’s look means.

“Learn to take a cab,” Zayn tells them, then he turns and leaves. The job might not have gone down yet; there’s time. Maybe he can help. Maybe he can do something.

\---

_The truck is big, armored, but other than the dark SUV behind it, it’s fairly inconspicuous as it drives along the road towards the warehouse. Inside, the guard fiddles on his phone, his fleshy face tired; the driver stares at the road._

_“Don’t see why we’re moving these tonight,” the driver mumbles._

_The guard shrugs. “Secrecy or something, right? We’d draw more attention, if we went during the day.”_

_“But only a carful of guards?” the driver shakes his head, as he makes a turn. Its escort follows behind it, keeping up despite the other cars slowly gathering. Busy night, apparently. “Seems like if what’s in the back’s so valuable, should be a bit more protection.”_

_“The police are on standby.” The guard taps at his gun in its holster. “And so am I. Anyone tries—”_

_The car in front of the truck slams on its breaks, and the driver swears, slamming on his. “The—”_

_“Out of the truck!” comes a rough voice, pounding on the door, and the guard swears this time, fumbling with the panic button. His finger’s on it when the door’s yanked open. There are ten men around them, and their escort nowhere to be seen; the sound of gunfire comes as if from far away._

_“Stay away.” The guard’s hand is trembling on his gun, but he raises it._

_“Can’t do that. Put down your gun, and you can leave, no harm no foul.” A man in a dark jacket tells him. His hand doesn’t shake. One of the other men grunts; it’s unclear if it’s in agreement or dissent._

_“I can’t do that,” The guard’s voice quavers. “The police will be here any second. You won’t get away with this.”_

_One of the other men, closer to the driver, laughs. “Any second, in LA traffic? Could take them hours, man. You’re shit out of luck.”_

_More gunfire rings out. The driver winces. “We can go,” he whispers, to the guard. “We don’t have to say—”_

_“Stay away!” The guard snaps, as one of the men moves towards the back. “I—”_

_“Oh shut up,” someone else groans, and a gunshot rings out. The guard drops. The driver squeaks._

_“I don’t…”_

_The flash comes all at once, bright and blinding in the LA night. The men are still blinking the light out of their eyes when the first arrow hits. Three more men crumble by the time their leader spins, starting to swear—arrows in the legs and arms, that leave the men on the ground._

_“Come out!” the leader cries, and the driver scrambles away from the truck as a man in dark leathers with a bow in his hand and a hood pulled low over his face drops to the ground from the top of the truck. He’s small, the driver thinks at first, too small—but he moves like a whirlwind, and the men, not trained to fight together, fall with little trouble, as he lashes out with bow and fist._

_It’s mere minutes until the leader’s the only one left standing, in his dark leather jacket, and he wades in with his fists and his face set, flicking open a switchblade. The man in the hood doesn’t hesitate, sending off an arrow that’s ignored before he blocks the first punch. He doesn’t wince as the blade slices over his side, digging past the leather; just grabs and twists, and the blade falls, then there’s another lash and the leader falls, his temple stained red as his hair._

_“Interesting.”_

_The man in the hood spins, and there’s one more man standing at the trunk—a man with a cool smile and icy blue eyes, a scar slashed from his right eyebrow to his ear. “I’m sorry we couldn’t put up more of a challenge for you, but good help is hard to find.”_

_The man in the hood lunges, and the scarred man meets him, a knife in each hand. He blocks his first strike, his second slicing at the man in the hood’s ribs. The man in the hood throws himself backwards, draws his bow, but his first shot is knocked away and he rolls to avoid the slash of a knife. He surges back to his feet, blocks the next swing of the knife with his bow, but he’s being driven back, step for step—_

_There’s a sound behind them, and both fighters disengage. The man in the hood pivots, to keep an eye on both assailants, his bow drawn before he’s finished turning—but it’s sirens, coming closer, the lights flashing in the night. The man in the hood swings his bow back, but his opponent is gone, disappeared._

_In an instant, the bow swings to the driver, who’s sobbing quietly against the truck._

_“What is in the van?” the man demands. The driver hiccups, stares at him with terrified eyes._

_“Don’t kill me!”_

_“What is in the truck?” The man repeats, and the driver covers his face._

_“I don’t know, please don’t kill me, I just drive, I don’t know, don’t—” Sirens cut him off, loud and raucous, and the man in the hood looks up. The flashing lights catch a single look of him—then in the next flash of the light he’s gone, and the police cars skid to a stop next to the driver, left alone among the unconscious and bleeding bodies._

_In the distance, a man with a scar on his face gives himself a satisfied smile, and turns away._


	4. Chapter 3

There’s something off about it. It nags at Zayn even after he wakes up to the rising sun on his face, forcing away the aches and pains, as he does his laps, as he makes himself breakfast. The cut on his arm is barely anything, didn’t even need stitches, but there’s something grating at him, something wrong.

It wasn’t the fight. Or, it was the fight, the one he would have lost—the thugs were easy, but that other man, the one with the scar…he’d have won. Zayn knows that. He’d have won, and Zayn hates that, can’t have that. But more than that, there aren’t many people who can beat him. Not trained as he was, Slade and Shado and the island. So what is it that someone wants in those trucks that they would set a man like that on it? That they would kill for it?

More than that, though, is the fact that he hadn’t come out until Zayn had taken everyone else down. He hadn’t thought he would be needed, clearly—had thought everyone else would be enough. They would have been enough for such a poorly guarded convoy if Zayn hadn’t been there. Why would it be so poorly guarded, and yet have someone ready to kill for it?

He flicks on the TV for the noise of it. Harry apparently isn’t coming today, which is fine. They’ve never talked about it, and Harry probably shouldn’t come. Should stay away, really. Zayn should keep him away. _Selfish._ But the TV is noise, and maybe they’ll say something about the attempted theft.

Zayn sighs as he sees who’s on screen, but he doesn’t feel like changing it.

“This is why we’re in danger!” Trump thunders, slamming his hand on the podium. “This here, this is the problem, this is the problem with America. Let me tell you, about these homegrown terrorists, attacking our businesses, attacking America!” Zayn frowns. Good to see people are still as stupid as they were five years ago. “

Zayn snorts, and changes the channel. Nothing new. Listening to that, he almost misses the island. At least there, even when he didn’t know the enemy, he could fight it. At least the hatred wasn’t this shit he’s dealt with his whole life. He’d rather have Slade’s mindless, insane, mirakuru and jealousy inspired vengeance than this.

CNN is talking about Hilary’s campaign plans for the last few months before reelection, and the Repulicans’ attempts to regain their failing lead. The next channel is talking about more terrorist attacks in Lebanon. The next has golf. The next flashes a blurry picture, with the words HERO OR THREAT underneath it, and Zayn turns it back up, scratching at Rhino’s head as he noses at Zayn’s hip for some attention.

“He’s a dangerous threat,” the commentator, a balding man in a sharp suit. “Violence is violence.”

“But who knows what would have happened if he hadn’t stopped the robbery last night?” the woman next to him points out sharply. “Maybe only violence can stop violence.”

“He’s a menace,” the man insists. “Who knows if he was stopping the robbery? Maybe he was behind it. We only have the word of a traumatized man, and who knows what would have happened if the police had come a few minutes later. Masked men rarely have good intentions.”

“Men rarely have good intentions,” A different woman jokes, and Zayn rolls his eyes and changes the channel again, then pulls his computer over to him. He’s wasted enough time. Time to do something useful. The truck had a logo on it—SyOps, he thinks. Or something like that.

A preemptive google search doesn’t show anything, just a company website that doesn’t give any real information and a single mention in a blog post, talking about its CEO, a woman named Jenna Howard. The name sounds familiar, but more importantly, there are hits on her. She’s followed a pretty standard CEO path, it looks like, moving up through various companies, and it doesn’t even look like SyOps is her latest—she was in charge of some tech company, last he sees. There’s no mention of SyOps there—not until he notices the logo, on the bottom of the website of the tech company. It’s the same one as on the trucks. A merger?

An hour later, Zayn’s staring at his screen. It makes sense, he supposes, except for how it doesn’t. Why criminals would want something from a weapons manufacturer is clear. Why it would be so poorly guarded, is not. Did they trust anonymity? That seems stupid, and risky, clearly. Tactically stupid, in a way Zayn had found that people who lived their lives around weapons rarely were. Wouldn’t weapons manufacturers be even more obsessive over security?

His phone rings, and Zayn glances at it. Louis. He stares at it for a moment—this is weird, he knows it is, he has to chase it down—but he thinks about Louis last night, staring him down, and pulls open the phone.

“Hey,” Louis says, without preamble. “Come outside.”

“What?”

“Come outside.”

Zayn glances at his screen. He’s getting somewhere. “I can’t, Louis.”

“Are you doing something?”

Zayn sighs. “Yes.”

“Have you left the house in the past forty-eight hours?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Louis…”

“Fine.” The phone rings off, and Zayn tosses it aside, turns back to his computer. There have to be records about what was in that truck, he knows that much about companies. But he might have gotten better with some brute force computer work, thanks to Slade’s basic tutelage— _computers don’t forget, pretty boy. People do, but computers don’t. That’s where secrets live, and secrets keep you alive_ —but he can’t hack in remotely. Probably not in person either, though he’d have better luck with that. Maybe…

The buzzer goes, and there’s a knife in Zayn’s hand, pointing towards the door.

Zayn takes a breath, and puts it down. It’s a doorbell. That’s all. And on the other side of the door, apparently, is Louis, with a child in his arms.

Zayn raises his eyebrows, but Louis’s here, he can’t just—can’t just leave him there. He doesn’t know why he’s here, or what he wants, but he’s here.

“Zayn, I know you’re there, you can’t fool me,” Louis calls, through the door. Zayn’s pretty sure he’s BSing. “Open up.”

Zayn sighs, and pulls open the door. “Hey.”

“Hey. See, I told you you weren’t doing anything, you aren’t even dressed yet.” Louis shifts the boy on his hip, who’s staring at Zayn with big blue eyes that make it very clear who he is. “Get dressed. We’re going to the playground.”

Zayn glances inside. The playground sounds exposed, and there are—shit, there are kids there. Zayn can’t risk that.

“I can’t.”

Louis rolls his eyes, and nudges his son. “Okay, Fred. We talked about this.”

The little boy glances at Louis, who nods encouragingly, then looks back at Zayn, his eyes big under sandy blonde hair. He looks a lot like Louis, from what Zayn remembers of his baby pictures; it’s clear he is a lot like Louis, from the way he widens his eyes, juts out his lower lip. “Uncle Zayn, please come with us to the playground!” he asks, pleading. “I want to play with you!”

Shit. Zayn glares at Louis. “That’s playing dirty.”

“What are you talking about?” Louis’s innocent face is not as good as his son’s, not anymore. “He just wants to get to know his Uncle Zayn.”

Uncle Zayn. Zayn is an uncle now for real, the little girl in England who never knew him. With all the cousins who’d changed so much since he’d been gone, so he doesn’t know them, not anymore. In the kitchen, there’s a knife—what if Freddie had been here, when he’d been startled like that?

“Please?” Freddie asks, and reaches out towards Zayn. “I wanna play!”

“Fine.” Zayn really should be able to resist this. Slade would have. Would have laughed to see Zayn fall so easily. _You have a predator in you after all, pretty boy._ That’s why he’d kept Zayn alive. But still, Zayn sighs. “Let me get dressed.”

“Yay!” Louis holds up his hand for his son to high five, which he does, giggling. “Awesome work, Fred. Chip off the old block.”

“Clearly,” Zayn drawls, and heads upstairs. He showers quickly, shrugs on some of the clothes Harry had gotten with him, then goes back downstairs. The Tomlinsons aren’t in the entranceway anymore, but apparently Tomlinson noise is inherited, because he can hear Freddie’s babbling in the kitchen.

The knife’s back in the block, where Louis must have put it. And Zayn’s computer is closed, thankfully. Freddie’s sitting on the counter, kicking his feet, as Louis keeps one hand on him to steady him and uses another to pour him a glass of water, his eyes on the TV. Trump’s back on, saying something about the evil Chinese and the evil democrats.

“She follows me on twitter,” Louis says, nodding at the TV.

“Trump?”

“Nah, like. That woman next to him. Some fan pointed it out. She’s his second in command, or something.” Zayn can see her, a middle-aged woman in a mauve pants suit with a tight bun, standing just behind Trump. “It’s really weird. Don’t know what she cares about me for.”

“Not that popular anymore?”

“Shut up,” Louis retorts, and hands his son the glass of water. He’s moving through Zayn’s kitchen like he knows it, but he shouldn’t. He doesn’t. He’s never been here before, would never have stepped foot in here before Zayn left. He’d hated Zayn. That Zayn had been sure of. “I always had more followers than you. Just because I didn’t want to go solo doesn’t mean I wasn’t popular.” Zayn waits, but it doesn’t sound bitter. “Anyway, you good to go? Fred? Ready for the swings?”

“Swings!” Freddie chants, and lets go of the glass in his excitement. Zayn grabs it before it can hit the counter, sets it down. He knows firsthand how much broken glass hurts when it shatters. “I wanna swing, daddy!”

“Bet you do. Can I tell you a secret?” Louis asks, leaning over to set Freddie on the ground. “Uncle Zayn hasn’t been on swings in a long time. You might have to teach him how they work.”

Freddie nods, seriously. “I’m super good at swings,” he tells Zayn, and holds out his hand with the same imperiousness Louis used to barge into his life. “I can show you. But you won’t be better than me.”

“No?” Zayn asks, and feels himself smiling.

\---

Freddie drags him to the swings once they get to the park, Louis following behind, laughing. He insists on Louis pushing him, as he demonstrates proper holding on technique and how to pump his legs. The sun’s bright, the temperature pleasantly cool, and even if there are plenty of people out somehow only a few of them look twice at them. Things really have changed, Zayn thinks, and doesn’t know how that feels.

Because things have changed, but somehow, it also feels like…not like they haven’t, but like he’s in some alternate reality. Freddie shows him how to swing, and Louis laughs and teases him for letting a four year old beat him, and it’s like before. Before before, before the ice that had frozen between them, after Zayn had left. What Zayn had hoped he might have with Louis and his son, before he realized how permanently some bridges had burned.

“Can we get ice cream, daddy?” Freddie asks, once he’s tired of the swings and of showing Zayn the slide and how high he can climb, and comes running back to where Louis’s been waiting on a bench, watching. “I want ice cream.”

“No ice cream for you. You’ll need a nap soon.”

“Nu-uh!”

“Uh-huh,” Louis counters, sticking out his tongue. Freddie jumps into his lap to grab for it, but he misses.

“I don’t want to nap, I want to play!”

“You can play for a little while longer,” Louis allows, glancing at his watch. “It’s not like Uncle Zayn has anywhere better to be.”

It’s not false. Zayn sits down on the bench next to Louis, because he’d forgotten how tiring kids are. How tiring, and how simple, with their laughter, the way he grins at Zayn and doesn’t know what’s underneath. It’s unnerving. As unnerving as it is to be out in the sun, in the open, with so many people all around him, without his bow. He feels surrounded, hemmed in; there are too many angles and none he knows. It’d be easy—

“Daddy always says I have to nap, even when I don’t want to,” Freddie’s explaining to Zayn, or maybe it’s complaining. “But usually I’m good about it, ‘cause he said you used to take lots of naps, before you died, and I’ve got to live up to—”

“Freddie!” Louis snaps, suddenly. “Remember the secret!”

“Right.” Freddie doesn’t look particularly apologetic. “But I don’t wanna take a nap.”

“What do you have to live up to?” Zayn asks. Louis’s forehead furrows, but Zayn’s curious. What’s this secret?

“You!” Freddie chirps, bouncing up and down on his feet. “He says ‘cause we have the same name I’m as cool as you, and cool kids nap.”

“Not dance?” Zayn mutters, and Louis makes a sound that’s half snort and half groan. Zayn ignores him. “We have the same name?”

“Yeah!” Freddie grins, clearly excited by this. “’Cause your name means king and my middle name is Reign, which is what kings do!”

“You have five more minutes at the playground,” Louis cuts in. He’s got the shuttered look on his face like he’d always gotten when he’d given more away than he wanted. “Do you want to use it on the slide, or on talking to Uncle Zayn?”

“Slide!” Freddie yells, and runs off. Zayn watches him go, his feet pounding as he runs, then glances at Louis. His arms are crossed over his chest, his chin jutting out.

“Louis…”

“It’s nothing.”

“You named your kid after me.”

“It’s not after you. It’s a coincidence. It’s just easier to get him to sleep with shit like that.”

“Louis.”

“Mum used up the last of the dead relatives with the twins. I needed someone.”

“Louis.”

Louis’s face is pinched, and he’s determinedly looking at the playground rather than at Zayn. “You died. He was born. It seemed like it meant something.”

It rings true, the way it seems like Louis’s only letting it out under duress, the sentiment of it. Louis always was more sentimental than he liked to admit.

Still… “You hated me.” Zayn says it certainly. There are things he knows, things he knew on that island, and one of those was that Louis hated him, had hated him until the last. That he might have been mending fences with Liam, that he had faith in Niall’s eventual forgiveness, that Harry—well, Harry would know he’d reached out, in the end, but Louis…even in his darkest hours, when he’d been holding onto thoughts of home like a dream he never really believed could come true, Zayn hadn’t bothered deceiving himself. Then he’d come back, and nothing was what he expected. “Why are you doing this, Louis? Throwing me parties, introducing me to your son. You hated me.”

Louis doesn’t answer, but he winces, clear under the midday sun. Vulnerability. Good. That leads to truth.

“I know you hated me,” Zayn goes on, watching closely. He doesn’t get it. Hatred doesn’t change, not without reason, and Zayn’s learned not to trust reasons he doesn’t see. So he pokes. Pushes the buttons he knows Louis has. “I tried reaching out, and you didn’t let me. The last time we talked, you only picked up to tell me to go to hell.”

“You weren’t supposed to take it literally!” Louis snaps, the sudden blast of emotion he’s never been able to contain. This is when Louis tells the truth—when he’s too emotional not to. “Yes. I hated you. You fucked things up and you left me and I was terrified and alone and it was all your fault. But then you died. Zayn, I don’t think you realize.” He surges to his feet, but spins to face Zayn, staring down at him. Zayn twitches, resisting the urge to rise, to make sure he’s on even ground. But this isn’t the place for that. _Play the rabbit._

Louis’s fists are clenched, but he’s not setting up for a punch. “We thought you were dead. We went to your funeral. I was holding my baby son, and watching the other boys play with him and all I could think was that you were missing.” He’s glaring, a challenge like Louis’s emotion always is. “That my son would never know someone who should’ve been his uncle, and the last thing I’d told my best friend was that he should go to hell. So yeah. I named him after you. Fuck off.”

He sets his jaw, his shoulder tensed like for a blow.

But Zayn doesn’t have a blow to give. Doesn’t know what to give.

“Lou…” He should go. Should run away, so they don’t get hurt. So he doesn’t hurt Louis and his son too, like he hurts everyone he cares for. He knows that. He just—he can’t. Weak. _Selfish_.

“Forget it, it’s done.” Louis throws himself back down, crosses his arms. “We’ve still got shit. I don’t know if I’ve forgiven you. But I don’t hate you.”

Zayn blinks. He remembers this, he thinks. The brash, aggressive emotion to hide the soft spots. The way they’d shoved at each other, keeping each other upright for too long.

“Knew it’d work,” he says at last, and that makes Louis look at him.

“What?”

“Knew dying would get you to stop hating me. Plan complete,” he tries a smirk, and Louis lets out a laugh.

“Fuck you,” he chuckles, throwing an elbow at Zayn. Zayn knocks it aside, and feels himself smile. The air is bright and warm, the sun’s high in the sky, and Louis doesn’t hate him. It’s what he dreamed of, back on the island, the dreams he barely let himself have.

Something prickles, on the back of his neck. Maybe he just isn’t used to being happy. But Zayn hasn’t lived so long without listening to those instincts.

“Louis,” he says calmly. “I think it’s been five minutes.”

“Oh, yeah. Let me grab Fred.” They both stand up. Louis heads towards the playground, but Zayn spins in a slow circle. There are plenty of people around, none of them particularly close—he doesn’t think anyone noticed their fight—but enough that no one stands out. Parents and their kids, a girl with a book, a man on his ipad with a hat to shield his head, an elderly couple strolling through. Nothing suspicious.

His neck prickles again. Something’s wrong.

He catches up to Louis quickly, puts a hand on his arm to notify him he’s here. “We should get to your car.”

Louis glances up from his argument with Fred about whether it’s been five minutes.

“What?”

“I…” Zayn trails off. What can he say? Something feels wrong. Why would Louis trust that? “I…I can’t…We’re too exposed here”

“Oh, yeah.” Louis gives him an almost pitying look, like he knows what he’s talking about, or why. “Come on, Fred. Uncle Zayn’s not feeling well.”

“But—”

“C’mon,” Louis groans, and swings him up onto his shoulders. Freddie laughs, protests forgotten, and it’s a joyous sound, but…Zayn glances around. Something’s still off.

“Let’s go,” Zayn says, and hurries his steps.

Freddie spends the car ride telling Zayn about what sort of ice cream he’s going to get. The longer he talks, the more time they spend in the car, the more Zayn relaxes again. Maybe he was being paranoid, had spent too long alone, surrounded by enemies. He doesn’t think so. But it’s possible. No one’s following them at least; he’s sure of that.

Either way, the threat’s behind them, and when they pull up in front of Zayn’s house, the prickling is gone.

“Bye Uncle Zayn!” Freddie waves from the backseat, his feet pounding against the passenger side seat.

“Bye Freddie.” Zayn waves. He glances at Louis. “Thanks.”

Louis shrugs. “Glad you managed being out of the house for a while. I’ll text you later.”

“Later,” Zayn agrees, and shuts the door.

The car pulls away, and Zayn heads back into his house. The computer’s still on the table, and Zayn picks it up, and heads downstairs. Someone, somewhere, knows why some weaponry was moving through the streets of LA basically unprotected. He just needs to find out who, and whether they’d like to taste his bow.

\---

 _Dinner tonight?_ Harry glances down at his phone, but he slides it back into his pocket with the text from Leah unanswered. He’s about to go onstage for an interview, he doesn’t have time to answer.

“Leah?” Liam asks, coming over to join him. He’s clearly just been in the makeup chair; his face has that shine to it that only comes from stage makeup. “How’s that going?”

Harry shrugs. Liam’s weirdly invested in all of their relationships, like he thinks getting married means he’s the expert. “As good as it was yesterday.”

“You can’t do that with me.” Liam rolls his eyes, stretching out his legs in front of him. “I know your tricks. Things aren’t going well?”

“They’re fine.” They are fine. They’re the same fine they always were. “We can’t all be blissfully married.”

“You could be.” Liam leans forward, looking just as earnest as he had at seventeen. “If you just gave her a chance—she seems really sweet, Haz. You could be good with her. I’ve always thought you could be really happy, if you met the right person—”

“Well, maybe I’ve just been working on that,” Harry grins. Liam needs to fuck off. He doesn’t know anything, about who would make Harry happy. About what Harry’d maybe could have had, if he hadn’t been too scared. About how Harry had been ripped apart. “Got to kiss a lot of frogs, right?” He leans forward too, because gay chicken’s kind of his thing. “Want to be one of them?”

“Oh, go away,” Liam laughs, and shoves at his shoulder. “I just want you happy.”

“I am happy.” Harry smiles wide, pushing his hair back out of his face, and he doesn’t think he’s lying. He might not be able to tell, at this point, but he doesn’t think he is.

Liam just looks at him, that slightly skeptical, discerning gaze that had always freaked Harry out when they were younger. “You are happier,” he agrees. “You’ve seemed better since…” he trails off, but they both know.

“Since Zayn came back to life?” Harry fills in. If he didn’t say it, Liam would have. “Yeah, having one of my best friends come back after I thought he was dead for five years does make me cheerful.”

“What about Zayn?” Louis asks. He perches on the arm of Liam’s chair, leaning forward. His lips twitch, and Harry doesn’t have to ask why he’s smiling. It’s still feels good, talking about Zayn in the present tense.

“Harry’s been happier since he’s back,” Liam explains. Harry rolls his eyes, but it’s Louis who replies,

“Yes, thank you for stating the obvious, Liam.” Liam pushes at him in response, but Louis catches himself before he falls. “I introduced him to Freddie.”

“What?” Harry smirks. “Did you tell him the meaning of Freddie’s middle name?”

“Fuck off. But yes.” Louis lifts his hand to mess with his hair, then drops it again, glancing over at the hair and makeup station where Niall’s sitting.

“Five to!” A producer calls, circling around, and they all obediently get up to take their places.

Interviews are easy, really. Harry’d never quite known why Zayn had gotten so nervous before them, why even Louis bristled afterwards sometimes. You just say what you want, don’t say what you don’t want, and smile when they look at you. It’s that easy.

This one is no different. They talk about the new album, about the tour that’s going to happen, the same thing’s they’ve been asked since they were sixteen.

“So,” the interviewer—he’s new, though they’ve been to the show before—says, after Louis talks about how he’s looking forward to touring again. “You guys have been doing these interviews for what, ten years?”

Niall laughs. “Yeah, ‘bout that.”

“Way to make us feel old, mate,” Louis adds. The interviewer chuckles.

“But in all that time, what’s one thing you’ve never been asked?” he goes on. Even this question has become a bit commonplace, especially after they got back from their hiatus. He supposes it makes sense; it looks like each show has a level of variation, even if they don’t, not really.

“You know,” Niall answers, because it’s his turn, “We’re never really asked about politics. No one ever wants to know our opinions on the American election.”

“I don’t know why,” Harry adds, throwing in a pout. “I think we’d have brilliant commentary.”

“Maybe because none of us can vote in the US?” Louis retorts, and Harry makes a face at him.

“Our opinions could still be valuable.”

“Or we could alienate everyone,” Liam points out, laughing as he shoves away Louis’s waving hand. “Maybe it’s best we don’t talk about that.”

“What, do you have controversial political opinions?” Louis jokes.

“I could!”

“Okay then, speaking about controversial issues—” This interviewer is game, Harry will give them that. Usually they let them riff for a little while then move back on to normal questions. “What about this vigilante, the man with the hood and the bow and arrows who everyone’s seen around? I’ve heard he’s been seen around you a few times. Do you think he’s dangerous?”

They have been giving interviews for ten years, so none of their eyes flick to Harry, but he knows they would. He’s the one who’s had the most encounters, or whatever. Who’s seen him the most.

“Well, he’s a guy with a bow and arrow,” Liam says. He’s the only one of them who hasn’t seen him, but Harry appreciates him taking the question. “How could he not be dangerous?”

“So you felt threatened by him? By the vigilante?”

“There’s a bigger problem here, though,” Harry inserts. He can hear what the interview is doing, how he’s phrasing it, and Harry—the answer is no, and Harry’s not sure why. The answer is Harry’s not threatened by this mysterious man with his hood and bow and arrow, who shot a man in the leg without hesitating, who he’s seen on the news standing over a robbed truck with his bow drawn. That man had saved him—and Leah—and Louis and Niall—from…well, something, he’s sure. He’d appeared out of the darkness and saved Harry.

So Harry smiles, and pushes back his hair. “We need a name for him. How does everyone keep saying all that about the hood and the bow? It’s such a tongue twister.”

“Some of us can speak faster than a word a minute,” Louis teases. Harry shrugs.

“Doesn’t he need a name? Something nice and snappy, right? I’m not the comics person, but isn’t that right?”

He can feel Liam shifting next to him, not sure where he’s going with this, but he’s up for it. “It is right. You have something in mind, Harry?”

“Oh god, don’t let him do it,” Niall groans.

“Hey, I’m good at naming things!”

“He named his cat ‘Cat’,” Liam tells the host.

“I was eight!” Harry huffs, making a face at Liam. “I’m better now.”

“So you do have a name?”

Harry hadn’t, actually; he’d just wanted to change the focus of the conversation, to make sure they weren’t talking about people being afraid of the man in the hood. But now everyone’s looking at him, and he knows people are watching this, and he flips through names as fast as he can. Hero names are nouns, something short and sharp. Something a little menacing, but not scary—the hood is scary, too many connotations there—he’s wearing green, something with that—

Harry thinks of the first moment he encountered him, of how the arrow had slid out of the dark and kept him out of danger. “Arrow,” he says, after what wasn’t actually a long pause. “The Arrow.”

Louis opens his mouth, then closes it, humming. “It does have a ring to it,” he allows.

“Well, maybe he’s watching and will take it under advisement,” Liam agrees.

The presenter, who’s mainly been letting them banter, nods. “He does seem like a bit of a One Direction fan.”

Harry doesn’t blush, because he hasn’t blushed on camera since he was seventeen—but if he were still seventeen, he thinks he might have.

\---

The interview finishes up quickly enough after that, and Harry gets up, wanders over to see if there’s food before he goes home. There isn’t anything that’s not loaded with oils and shit, but as he searches for a stick of celery, his phone buzzes.

It’s a screenshot of some meme on the internet, with the caption _thought_ _you might like this._

Harry can’t help his grin, can’t help how he messes with his hair. It’s just—it’s so Zayn, even now; the little things that haven’t changed. The bits of him that send Harry stupid jokes he might like, just because. The parts of him that Harry’s dreamed about for years.

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Louis says, popping up beside him and grabbing a mini burger. “Sexting during the interview, Harold?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Harry smirks.

“Anyway,” Louis keeps going, around yet a bite of his burger, “callhimthearrow is trending. So good job. You might have an angry vigilante on you asking why you named him that shit soon.”

“How on me are we talking?” Harry asks, smirking, and Louis grabs a carrot stick just to throw it at him. “What? He’s a very attractive man!”

“I am going somewhere where I’m not victimized for my language,” Louis tells him, which is the most hypocritical thing he’s possibly ever said, but it’s not worth calling him on it. Harry lets him leave, then looks down at his phone again.

The top two messages are Zayn’s joke, and Leah’s invitation to dinner. Harry looks at him, the two names side by side.

Then he opens Zayn’s conversation. _Dinner?_

 _Can’t. Sorry._ Zayn’s text comes back. Harry narrows his eyes at the phone, as he walks to his car. He’s glad Zayn is doing something, but what could he be doing?

It’s not his place to prod, though. He switches to Leah’s conversation. _Sure! Where did you have in mind?_

\---

“How’s the new song coming?” Harry jumps, and Leah laughs a little. “Woolgathering?”

“There are so many sheep!” Harry replies, grinning back across the table at her. It’s a nice restaurant, one of the experimental ones Jeff recommended, and it looks like she’s enjoying herself. She looks beautiful, definitely; Harry knows they look good together, from the looks people gave them as they walked in. Everything about the night should be perfect, romantic. This is what Harry’s good at—creating moments. It’s the rest of the time that he’s not sure about maintaining.

“More than usual tonight, it seems,” she teases, swirling a piece of pasta on her fork. “Bad day?”

“No, it was fine.” Zayn hadn’t been home in the morning, or he hadn’t answered when Harry had knocked, but that didn’t mean anything. Probably. He was probably with Louis, or maybe he’d reached out to one of his other friends, which Harry knows would be good. But he can’t shake the image of Zayn sitting alone in the dark house with just Rhino; or if something had happened to him…

“So the song is working?”

“Yeah, it’s coming along.” Harry shakes his head. Leah’s here. Zayn’s at home, or—he’s fine. He took care of himself for five years, and really for the five years before that too. He’d always been the one looking after Harry, the one comforting Harry. Now even when Harry’s trying to help, it never feels like it’s working. Except for sometimes…sometimes, he’s sprawled in a chair, not quite laughing but smiling at Harry, and the light had caught in his dark hair and in the shadows, for a second, he could have been twenty again, camped out in a hotel room ready to take on the world with Harry. Which maybe Harry had given him. Maybe he had helped make happen.

“Harry.”

“Sorry.” Harry grins again, apologetic this time. “What were you saying?”

“I was saying I had a shoot this morning…” she shakes her head as she trails off. “Do you want to get out of here? You’re clearly tired. We can go back to my place…”

Harry isn’t tired, honestly—he thinks that after the first part of One Direction, he has a different standard of tired than most people—but he nods anyway. This is probably what he needs, really. To fuck Leah until he stops thinking about Zayn at all, and how his skin feels under Harry’s hand.

“Luckily, I’m not that tired,” he smirks, and reaches out a hand to pull her to her feet, and out of the restaurant.

“Someone’s in a hurry,” Leah laughs, as Harry pulls her along. He hadn’t realized it before, but he is. It’s been days since he last got laid. When they get to his car, he glances around for any photographers, then when there aren’t any immediately apparent, pulls her close, so he can kiss her long and deep. She tastes of the strawberry drink she had at dinner, and it’s sweet and lovely and she’s a damn good kisser too. Harry lets himself sink into it, into her lips and her waist under his hands. He doesn’t think about anyone else, while he’s kissing her.

Maybe because they skipped dinner, it’s not too late when he leaves Leah in her bed with a goodbye kiss. It’s early enough that the stars are out—or they would be, if they could make it through the LA lights. Back in Holmes Chapel, you could sometimes see the stars, but those aren’t the stars Harry thinks of, when he thinks of a sky full of stars.

It was in 2012, maybe—in that time period Harry was so busy going he could barely keep track of his own age, let alone the year—in Miami or somewhere in Florida, or off the coast of it. It was before all the other shit, though, Harry knows that—before Zayn started drawing into himself, before they all started pretending they didn’t notice how dissatisfied he was, before Harry had started pulling away a little so he wouldn’t lose himself with little hope of return. Back when they were young and on top of the world, and had no idea anything could change that.

They had all rented a boat for a few days, had gone out somewhere. Harry hadn’t been able to sleep, for some reason he couldn’t remember, so he’d gone out onto the deck—and Zayn was there, sitting on a chair a fair ways away from the edge. He’d been gilded in moonlight, and Harry can still remember that image, how his breath had caught at the sight of Zayn lit by the moon. Zayn was always beautiful, but sometimes it hit Harry so hard, it was like he took up all of his vision, all of his brain, until everything else was white noise except for Zayn.

Zayn must have heard him, or something, because he looked over at Harry and opened his arms a little, with that small, inviting smile that Harry loved because it only happened in the quiet moments. He’d gone without hesitation, cuddled into Zayn’s side and rested his head on his shoulder. Harry’d glanced up at him once, at the strong cut of his jaw, the play of his eyelashes, the plushness of his lips as he smiled fondly at Harry, and there’d been a moment…but then Harry had looked away, looked up, and together they’d watched the stars, had fallen asleep together like that.

Harry’d thought about that moment too often for the next few years, wondered what would have happened if he’d made a different choice. If he’d kissed Zayn then. Wondered if anything would have changed—if Zayn would have been on that plane at all, if he could have kept Zayn alive.

Even now, looking up through his windshield at the stars, his mind’s going back to that night. He wants to see the stars again.

He pulls over onto the side of the road, near a playground. It’s empty now, but it’s close enough to Harry’s house that he drives past it a lot during the day, sees it filled with kids. Harry’s taken Lux there before, when she’s in town; has come here with Freddie when he gets time with him. It’s funny, how he’s never thought about bringing a kid of his own here, when he knows everyone teases him about being baby crazy.

Harry sits down on a swing, glances up. There are barely any stars, but he knows they’re there. He should ask Niall what constellations they can see from here, when Aquarius could pop up. Or maybe he’ll google it later.

“You shouldn’t be here alone this late.”

Harry grabs at the ropes of the swing, overbalances, and flails out his legs to balance himself. When he finally manages that, he finds the source of the voice.

The Arrow is standing a little ways away. It’s the first time Harry’s seen him when he’s not already terrified; the first time he can really take a chance to look at him, in the shadows from the streetlight. Not that Harry can see much, but there’s a strong jaw, and the leather doesn’t leave anything to the imagination, not that Harry’s complaining. His bow is on his back, and he’s standing straight and tall, even though Harry suspects he actually isn’t.

Harry’s still not afraid, though. Maybe it’s stupid of him, maybe it’s arrogant, but he’s not afraid of this vigilante. The thrill that goes up his spine definitely isn’t fear.

“But I’m not alone. You’re here,” Harry points out, grinning. Maybe he’s just got sex brain, but the Arrow’s got the sort of biceps Harry wouldn’t mind holding him down. It’s clearly been too long since he’s been with a guy. It’s just…harder. Less convenient, maybe. Girls usually work well enough, and there aren’t…comparisons, with them.

The Arrow doesn’t reply for a moment, just looks at Harry. Or Harry thinks he does, he can’t tell under the hood.

“I hear I have you to thank for my new name,” he says at last.

Harry runs a hand through his hair. He almost feels like blushing. He hadn’t even thought of that, that maybe he wouldn’t like it, that maybe he wouldn’t want some random person giving him a name… “Like it? I think it’s catchy.”

“I don’t have a choice, apparently.” The Arrow doesn’t quite shrug, but his shoulder moves.

“Yeah, don’t think you do. You’re branded.” Harry smirks, and kicks out his legs in front of him, so they’re shown to their best advantage. “Trust me, I’m a bit of a branding expert.”

He can almost feel the Arrow’s regard like a weight on his skin, even though he can’t see his eyes. It makes Harry want to shiver, want to perform. He’s always loved it when people looked at him. So he pushes back his hair, lets his lips press together in a bit of a pout.

“You do like to play with fire,” the Arrow agrees, slowly. Almost like he’s confused.

If a bit of harmless flirting is going to confuse the Arrow, Harry’s a bit worried about him as a…hero or vigilante or whatever he is. His main impression about superheroes is from when he used to read comics over Zayn’s shoulder when they were hanging out, but he’s pretty sure there are usually femme fatales hanging around them. Or homme fatales, if that’s what the Arrow’s into.

“Well, you’re the one who’s here. Even though I’m not in danger.” Harry points out. The Arrow doesn’t move. “Or are you just a One Direction fan?”

There it is—the reaction. The Arrow twitches a little, and when he speaks, Harry’s pretty sure there’s an edge to it that might be a smile. “I could be.”

Harry laughs. It’s loud in the nighttime, and the Arrow twitches again, his hand rising to wrap around his bow. It makes his muscles shift, flex.

“Yeah?” Harry asks. He wants the Arrow to look at him again. “Who was your favorite?” He narrows his gaze. “Be aware, I’ll be very offended if it wasn’t me.”

“I loved you all,” the Arrow says, and there’s something…off, in it. Maybe he doesn’t like to talk about his love of One Direction. He’s a fairly grown man, of some sort. That could make sense.

“But me most of all, right?” Harry demands.

“Go home, Harry.” The Arrow replies, which Harry can tell is blatantly not an answer. “Don’t hang around in the dark parks.”

“I’m taking that to mean I was your favorite and you’re too embarrassed to admit it.”

“Go home,” The Arrow says again, glancing to the road. Harry follows his gaze—and when he looks back, the Arrow’s gone.

Well, shit. Harry stares at the place he was. Then he gets up to go back to his car. Maybe it isn’t the best idea to sit in dark parks alone, even in this neighborhood of LA. Maybe he wants to go home and think about the Arrow’s arms, and Zayn’s smile, and the stars.


	5. Chapter 4

It’s funny, the things you don’t lose even after years apart. Zayn and Harry still move easily around the kitchen together, chopping vegetables, throwing some chicken on. They’ve never even lived together, not really, but after five years they’d learned each others’ rhythms, and apparently they haven’t forgotten. Zayn’s hand is gentle as he pushes at Harry’s hip to move him so he can get to the sink; Harry catches Zayn watching him as he sings idly to himself.

“Is that new?” he asks.

“Yeah.” It’s something Harry’s been playing with, probably not even for himself. It doesn’t quite have lyrics yet, but looking at Zayn, he might be thinking of some. “Just playing.”

“Sounds good.” Zayn turns back to his chopping board.

Harry watches Zayn’s shoulders for a second. The shirt he’d put on after Harry had interrupted his swim is thin enough that Harry can watch the muscles of his back move as he wields the knife, the motions quick and efficient.

“Maybe it’s the way she walks,” he starts, and pauses after the end of his verse. He can’t imagine Zayn doesn’t remember the next lines, and even if he could, Zayn’s hand slows for a second, before picking up his rhythm again.

Harry sighs. “So you’re serious about not singing?”

“What’s the point of it?” Zayn shrugs. Harry turns the heat down on the chicken, then slides up behind Zayn. He moves slowly, deliberately—he’s not stupid enough to throw himself at Zayn like he might once have when Zayn’s jumpy and holding a knife. So he eases himself close to Zayn, his hands sliding around Zayn’s waist. It’s just physical comfort, he tells himself; hooking his chin over Zayn’s shoulder, like he’s done a thousand times before.

“Because you have an obligation to share your face with the world?” Harry suggests. Zayn’s still tense, even if he’s still chopping quickly. “Because eventually you’ll run out of money and need to make more?” It gets a twitch out of Zayn, but the knife keeps moving. Harry sighs. “Because you love to sing. Because it’s what you’ve always wanted?”

The knife slows. Zayn’s grip on it is shifting, his fingers running over the handle like he might have once held a microphone. “Wants change,” he says, and his voice is hoarse. He picks up the knife, flips it, and scrapes the vegetables onto a plate. “And the chicken is burning.”

“No it’s not!” Harry protests, but he gives Zayn a final squeeze around the waist and lets go. It’s probably better, that he has a second facing the chicken to school himself back. If someone had asked him six years ago if Zayn would ever stop making music, he’d have laughed in their face. Even when Zayn had left, before he’d signed his deal, Harry had known. Zayn wouldn’t have stopped creating if you’d paid him.

He glances over his shoulder at Zayn. He’s looking at the vegetables, but Harry can’t read anything else in him. What happened to him, he can’t help but wonder. What made him into this?

But he’s still Zayn, Harry reminds himself, and turns the heat off. He’d still laughed at Harry’s jokes. He still snaps to attention to protect Harry. He’s still Zayn, which is a problem all its own.

“The chicken looks fine,” Zayn mutters, and this time it’s Harry who nearly jumps. Zayn’s always been sneaky. Now, when Harry spins around, he’s too close—if he took a step forward he’d be caging Harry into the counter. Except he’s not looking at Harry; he’s glancing down at his hands, like he doesn’t know what to do with them. “I didn’t mean…”

“I know.” Harry takes a breath, smiles. “I can tell when you’re joking, Zayn.”

Zayn’s mouth twists. “You might be the only one.” His breath is a bit ragged. “I’m not even sure I can, anymore.”

“Zayn.” Harry can’t help himself anymore; he gives in to the urge to rest his hands on Zayn’s hips, rub his thumbs over the bare skin between his sweatpants and his t-shirt. They’ve always been tactile—Zayn was this way with everyone, and Harry’d only been only too eager to give him comfort in the way he needed. And he’s found he likes it too; maybe not like Zayn had used to, how he needed to touch all the time, but he likes the way it had felt to just breathe with Zayn’s skin against his. “Don’t worry, I was always the funny one anyway.”

Zayn’s lips twitch, but not enough. “I just…I don’t know how to talk to people anymore, it feels like. So, like. ‘m sorry if I say something…”

“You’ve always been an asshole. Don’t worry about it.” Zayn’s smile is small, but there, and Harry can feel him relax.

Harry goes slowly again, but he pulls Zayn in, close against him, and Zayn comes like he always had—or not like he always had; he’s stiff as Harry wraps his arms around him, not like how he’d used to collapse into Harry, or let Harry collapse into him. But his arms come around Harry’s waist, and Harry can feel him breath against his neck.

“Haz?” His lips brush Harry’s skin there, and he tries to suppress a shiver. This isn’t about that. Or he doesn’t know, but it’s not just about that.

“Yeah?”

“Now the chicken really is burning,” Zayn says, and he’s smirking when Harry swears, which Harry takes as enough of a victory to offset the overdone chicken.

\---

It’s a nice restaurant. Maybe that was Harry’s mistake, he thinks; the nice restaurant. They should have gone somewhere more casual, more lowkey, no matter how good the food is. Now Zayn’s uncomfortable because this is too public for him, and Leah’s uncomfortable because she thinks it’s because of her that Zayn’s uncomfortable, and Harry’s uncomfortable because this wasn’t what he had wanted.

He’d thought it was a good idea. Get Zayn to go out somewhere in public where he’s exposed to other people, but where he could just focus on Harry rather than having too many people approaching them. But then Harry’d mentioned where he was going to lunch to Leah and she’d talked about how she loved the restaurant and Harry couldn’t tell her she couldn’t come at that point, and now it’s the three of them, and it’s more awkward than it should be.

It’s no one’s fault. Leah’s trying to make small talk, and Harry would contribute, except he’s busy watching Zayn to make sure he’s okay. And Zayn’s…quiet. Maybe he’s just quiet because he’s being quiet, because even years ago he tended to be quiet with people he didn’t know. Maybe he’s quiet because he doesn’t like Leah. Maybe he’s being quiet because he’s close to running out of the building again. Harry can’t tell.

“Are you working on anything new, then?” Leah asks, and Harry might wince, if he was someone else. “Music-wise? Harry says you’ve been holed away a lot.”

Zayn looks up from his pasta. “Um, not really. I, like. It’s mainly been reading and shit. Catching up.”

“Makes sense.” Leah takes another bite of salad. “If you need any help, I can—”

“Zayn?” The voice doesn’t come from their table, and Zayn does flinch, his head jerking up and around. Harry reaches out before he thinks, so his hand’s on Zayn’s wrist, hopefully more comfort than restraint.

But then Zayn’s relaxing. He’s still tense, but he doesn’t have that cornered animal edginess, and his lips curve up. “Perrie?”

And then Harry could swear it was seven years ago, because Perrie Edwards is coming to their table, and Harry’s stomach twists. He’s seen her here and there in the last few years—he knows Louis’s even hung out with her a few times—but he’d forgotten, somehow, just how pretty she is—that long blonde hair, the bright smile. He’d forgotten how much it hurt to see Zayn smile at her.

“It really is you! I didn’t—I mean, I knew, but I didn’t believe…” she trails off, her blue eyes wide as she stares at Zayn. “You really aren’t dead.”

“Disappointed?” Zayn’s lips twist into something wry and mirthless.

“Don’t be stupid. I never wanted you dead.” She pauses. “Well, only for a few moments, and never for real.” She reaches out, her hand going to Zayn’s cheek, and Zayn tilts his head into it with the instinct of long habit. Harry takes a sip of his water. He’s not twenty, he doesn’t have to hate the view of them together, so beautiful and easy. When they were together, at least. Sometimes Harry had wanted to scream at her, to ask her if she knew what her fiancée did on tour, how he looked at Harry, if she would just break up with him already so then he’d be free and Harry—

But they aren’t twenty, and they aren’t together, and next to him, Leah is clearing her throat very quietly.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude.” Perrie turns from Zayn, though she keeps stealing glances at him, the same way Harry does. “Hi, Harry. And who’s this?”

“This is Leah. Leah, Perrie.”

“Nice to meet you.” Perrie holds out her hand, and Leah shakes it, smiling back. There’s no ring on Perrie’s finger, Harry can’t help but notice. He can’t tell if Zayn did. “I’ll leave you to your dinner, I just had to…” she trails off.

“Of course.” Harry smiles, sweetly as he can. He’d resented her for years, but he’d always liked her well enough. “It was nice seeing you, Perrie.”

“You too. Zayn…”

“Actually, do you have a moment?” Zayn’s pushing back his chair, and Harry freezes. They’d broken up. And Harry hasn’t said anything, doesn’t have a reason to grab at Zayn, keep him here. His girlfriend’s sitting right next to him. But he still wants to protest. “Can we talk?”

Perrie glances over her shoulder, to a table where a man sits, watching her. He’s handsome enough, Harry thinks, but he supposes once you’ve had Zayn no one else will quite match in the looks department. “Yeah, sure, for a second.”

“It won’t take long.” Then Zayn’s pushing up, and leading Perrie away with a hand on her arm. They’d walked like that often, with that one point of contact, always keeping each other close. It’s not the same now, but it feels—they’re falling into each other. Again.

“She was his fiancée, right?” Leah asks, her voice quiet.

Harry doesn’t look away from the wall where they’re standing. Zayn’s a few inches taller than her, so he’s curving into her, talking lowly; she’s nodding. Zayn hasn’t talked that much to anyone other than Harry.

“Harry?”

“Oh, yeah. They called it off before he—before October, though.” Perrie’s hand is on his shoulder now, and she’s talking.

“Amicably?”

“I don’t know.” Harry doubts it, knowing them, knowing their relationship. They seem amicable enough now, though. Like they were at the start, when Zayn had glowed with it, so anxious to show her off to everyone as she giggled and made fun of him and Harry had pushed down his sullenness so he could be nice because Zayn wanted them to be.

Then Perrie is pushing up to kiss Zayn on his cheek, and she’s walking away, back to the man she’s with. Zayn comes back to their table, slides into his seat.

“Sorry.”

“What were you talking about?” Harry asks. He tries to soften it, but he finds he can’t. Not even with Leah sitting next to him.

“How we left things.” Zayn shrugs. “Just, had some things I had to tell her.”

_Later, Haz. Love you._ He’d said that to Harry, not Perrie. Those last words. Perrie didn’t get them, Harry did. That final love.

“So, have you read anything good, then?” Leah asks, into the silence that’s fallen between them again.

\---

It’s easy enough to break into the SyOps base. Or at least no harder than into the camps on the island. It’s a business at heart, not actually an armory, or even an R&D facility; those are off site. It makes this easier—to hotwire the alarm system, take out a few guards, shoot down the cameras.

Instead of going up, to the higher ups floors, Zayn goes down the stairs. _The people who know things are on the ground_ , Slade had said. _They’re the ones who keep the records, and the records tell us what we need to know._ So Zayn goes down.

The shipping office is on the ground floor, right above the trucks, and as Zayn suspected, there’s no extra security—just one camera, which is easy enough to divert. The office is messy but not disorganized, with rows of computers. He starts trying to logon, running down the row, until he finds—bingo. Someone always forgets to log off. _Never doubt human stupidity, pretty boy. Easiest way in, every time._

The background on this scene is grumpy cat, which apparently has survived the past five years. There’s some irony there, he thinks. Harry loves—

He shakes his head. He needs to focus. Not to think of how Harry had spent the whole morning at his before the awkward lunch. He’d been spread out on the couch, making Zayn listen to song after song that he’s deemed the best of the last five years, complete with commentary, for hours, his voice slow and soothing. Somewhere along the way his shirt had fallen open, like it had used to, and he’d only grown—

_It’s all your fault she’s dead, you selfish bastard!_

Zayn shakes his head. He has to focus. Focus on doing what he can to keep people safe. Even this is distracting him from the list, from Charles’ quest, but—he’s seen what destruction high-tech weapons can do, on the island. In the dense population of LA…he can’t leave them there. Can’t risk whoever wants them getting them.

The system is conveniently easy to use, with a nice UI; it’s easy for Zayn to find the record for the shipment. It would be easy to find even if Zayn couldn’t sort by date; it’s one of the only ones with a note on it-- _JH Approved._

Zayn makes a face at the screen. JH has to be Jenna Howard. What would the CEO of a company be doing approving shipments? He might not know much about the corporate world, but he’s walked in those circles; this isn’t a CEO’s purview. He clicks to the cargo area, and finds two serial numbers. Looking those up takes a bit more time; Zayn glances at the cameras, and around, but no one’s there. Apparently no one thinks anyone will be investigating this. That’s either sloppy, or arrogant.

Finally, he finds the entry in the company catalog. It’s specs, mainly; technical things he can’t understand. Sometimes, the fact that he never got more than a secondary school education doesn’t help. But he scans the specs, looking for anything he can recognize—and then he does.

He doesn’t know much about engineering. But he knows weaponry, and he can read a picture.

Zayn shoves back from the chair so he can stand, a hand on his bow more for comfort than to defend. Why were there bombs moving through LA? Who wanted them so much? And why, if the bombs were so powerful, would there be no guards on them?

\---

Harry watches idly from the table as Leah fusses around her kitchen. She’s lovely, in a cami and shorts, her hair just a little more mussed than usual before her shower, her skin still flushed from sleep. She’s so pretty. Pretty and sweet, and last night had been good.

“Hey.” She sets two bowls of fruit and granola on the table between them, and sits down. “What’s up?”

“Nothing,” Harry answers automatically. She nods, accepting. She always does that. Never pushes. Never gets past the evasions he uses like breathing. “Why?”

She shrugs. “You’re just quiet.”

“I can be quiet.”

“Of course you can.”

Harry nods, and digs his spoon in. The yogurt is just sweet enough, perfect. It’s always perfect. She’s always perfect, and she’s perfect for him, and the boys all approve. Liam had even said so, at dinner last night, when Harry had gone out with him and Diana. And then after, when Harry had come over to Leah’s for a nightcap and to stay over, Harry had fallen back on the bed after, let her curl into his side, and closed his eyes and thought of Zayn, lying by the pool, smiling at Harry.

It feels like he’s twenty again in so many ways, his whole mind full of Zayn all the time, even when it shouldn’t be. He’d learned, before, how not to do that. How to think of other things, how to push Zayn and the thing between them back, back to where it was safe. Where Harry was safe, hidden. They’d been friends, once. Then he’d left. Then he’d come back to life. Then he was talking to Perrie, and it was like Harry was twenty again, his chance closing fast.

“I’m going to get dressed,” Harry says, and pushes back from the table. Leah smiles.

“Pity, that.”

“Minx,” Harry teases, and saunters as he leaves. He’s been here enough that he knows which shower products he can use from her bathroom, but there’s nothing of his here. He’s never left his things anywhere, he thinks. He likes Leah, but when he thinks of ten years later, will he still want them eating in silence at a kitchen table?

Harry steps out of the shower, pulls on the change of clothes he’d brought last night. He’d known he was going home. Last night…it’s always weird, watching Liam and Diana. They’d all always known Liam would be the first married—it’s why Perrie had been such a surprise. Well, that, and…everything else, for Harry. But that’s an old hurt, one he’d never spoken. But watching the domesticity, how they moved around each other…Harry’s thinks he might want that. Someday. With someone.

He throws all his old clothes into his bag, replaces his wallet and phone into the pockets of his new jeans. Then he pulls his phone out.

It’s stupid. He knows it’s stupid. Harry’s always thought he was a pretty self-aware person, and he knows exactly why he’s never had that domesticity with anyone. Knows why, while Leah is a perfectly nice girl, is perfect for him, he’s never been in love with her. Knows that there is one person he’s ever imagined himself with, ten years later, and for five years he’d tried to find something else. Something that would sew him back together—something that would keep him from being ripped apart again. Now Zayn was back, and it could leave Harry bleeding again, but—he’d his chance once, or something that was maybe a chance, and he didn’t take it, and he hadn’t gotten another. Now all he can see is Zayn and Perrie again, their grown up selves, and he can’t—what if he misses his chance now, too? He’s not sure he’s ready, is still terrified of the pain of being emptied out, what if he doesn’t get another chance?

Harry opens the phone, pulls it to his ear. For the first time in months, since Zayn was found, he pushes the button for his voicemail, finds the last saved message.

_I want to talk_ , Zayn’s voice says. It’s a different voice, from the one he’d heard yesterday, at that restaurant watching Zayn and Leah talk, watching the candlelight shift over Zayn’s face—faster, more aggressive almost. Or maybe just younger. _Later, Haz. Love you_.

And there it is. Harry nods to himself. He’s not stupid, and he is self-aware, and he knows.

“Leah?” he says, coming back downstairs. She’s cleared his dishes already, and is on her computer, probably reading the news. She’s so perfect. Terrifyingly perfect. But she’s not Zayn. “We, um. Can we talk?”

Slowly, she closes her computer, and nods. “Yeah, we probably should.”

\---

_Fire. Fire everywhere. Fire and death and the smell of burning flesh and wood, and it’s all because of Zayn. He knows that, abstractly, but none of it matters. All that matters is Fyers in front of him, holding Shado tight._

_He’s talking, but Zayn learned long ago and far away how to look like he’s listening when he’s focused on something else. But all he can see is Shado. Shado, who taught him to hold this bow. Shado, whose father this bow is, who had saved Zayn time and again. Who had given his life for Shado, and for Zayn. Shado, who he wasn’t sure he loved but who he shared comfort with like no one else. Slade is next to him, saying things as well, but Zayn can only see the man holding Shado._

_The bow is steady in his hand. There is no time. Once he shoots, Fyers needs to die. Fyers has to die, or else Shado will die. It’s simple, when he thinks of it like that. One of those simple equations, where everything becomes clear. You want to go, let’s leave. You want to live, kill the bird. Shado has to live, so Fyers must die. It’s simple. Everything on the island is simple, when it comes down to it._

_Shado looks at him, and nods. In this light, somehow she looks like his sisters, though maybe that’s fucked up. She looks like his sisters, and almost like Perrie, who he fucked over, and everyone else from that other life so far away. And she looks like herself, beautiful and stronger than he could ever be._

_It’s like the moment before going on stage. Like the moment before he opens his mouth for a high note. A moment of stillness, of utter calm. Of knowledge, or surety. He takes final aim, ignoring the flickering lights of the fire, holds his breath, and lets the arrow fly._

_He misses._

_No, Zayn thinks, as he watches the arrow fly over Fyers’ shoulder. No, that’s not what happened. No, he’d hit. He’d hit and he’d killed Fyers, killed him in cold blood, and it had felt good, felt right, and then they’d—they’d escaped._

_“Oh boy. Did you really think you’d win?” Fyers taunts, and drags his knife across her throat, so it gushes red with blood. Zayn screams as he watches her fall. No, it hadn’t been like this—it had been Ivo who’d killed her, not like this, he hadn’t failed her this time—_

_“Stupid boy,” Slade says from next to him, suddenly in the mask, and there’s blood pouring from his eye. “You failed. You always fail. Not strong enough to follow through. This is why all your friends hate you. Why they fear you.”_

_Shado pulls herself up, her face deathly pale like the last time he’d seen her. “You aren’t even a proper killer. Too soft. Too soft and too weak. You’re broken, Zayn, and no one can love a broken man. I certainly never did.”_

_“Who could?” And it’s his mother, somehow unfazed by the fire rising higher. “You’re a danger to everyone.”_

_“You betray everyone,” Slade adds, and then his face is Louis’s, is somehow all the boys’ at once, is their white shocked faces when Zayn had told them. “Why would you deserve anyone? You selfish bastard.”_

_“No!” Zayn yells, and he draws his bow again. No, no no. This isn’t what happened, he succeeded. “No!” He yells again, and shoots._

_This time, the arrow thuds into Fyers’s throat, and he falls. Zayn rushes forward to check, to make sure, make sure he did it right—and he opens Harry’s eyes. Harry’s eyes and Harry’s face and an arrow through Harry’s throat._

_“No, no no no—” Zayn mutters, panicked, trying to pull the arrow out, to feel his heartbeat. “No no no…”_

Zayn comes awake between one breath and the next, tears in his eyes. He needs—Harry. Harry can’t be dead, he can’t be, Zayn won’t fail again, he won’t let that happen. He needs his bow, he needs to go—

Rhino noses at his leg, and Zayn takes a deep breath, opening his eyes to see his bedroom ceiling, the shadow of the bed next to him. A nightmare. Just a nightmare. He’d killed Fyers. Shado had lived, a little longer. Harry hadn’t been on the island. He’s safe. Or he should be.

He wipes the sweat off his brow, gets up from the floor. Outside, it’s still dark. Probably a few hours since he fell asleep.

He throws the blankets back onto the bed, tugs them into some semblance of made, so it looks like he’s slept there, just in case. Then he heads downstairs.

Downstairs is still dark, as he moves through it. But he knows where he’s going. He pulls out the bow, the same old bow he’d used to kill Fyers. Fyers was dead. He’d killed him. Fyers was dead, and so was Shado, and so was Slade. He’d killed all of them, though with Shado he hadn’t held the knife. Killed so many.

Zayn sets the bow down, then heads to the punching bag. The burn of it feels good in his muscles. He knows how to do this. How to hit. How to hurt. How to kill. He might not know anything else, might not be able to keep anyone safe, but he knows this.

\---

Three hours after he sat down with Leah, Harry’s pulling up in front of Zayn’s house. It had gone better than he expected; Leah had taken it well, because she was, of course, perfect. All “I thought this was coming for a while” and “let’s still be friends”, which he thinks they might be. And that’s the problem, Harry thinks. He’s friends with all his exes, and he—that’s what he’d wanted. He didn’t want to love with everything in him, to risk the pain of it again, but he can’t help it, it seems. Not when he’s already there, already in the midst of the storm.

Rhino’s barking meets his knock, then, a minute later, Zayn opens the door.

“Harry?” It comes out like a prayer, like he’d never expected to see Harry again.

“Are you okay?” Harry asks, before anything. There’s something wild in the way Zayn’s clutching at the doorframe, like he’s shaking, and in how he’s staring at Harry like he’s drinking him in. It’s almost like in that alley, after Zayn had run out of the club.

Zayn shakes his head, pushes his hair out of his eyes. Harry watches the movement. Watches the drop of sweat that drips down his neck. He must have just been working out, because his shirt is soaked in sweat, the sort of sweat that only comes from a real hard workout.

“I thought you were going to Leah’s last night?”

“I was.” Zayn steps back, letting Harry in, then closes the door behind him and leans back against it. God, he’s beautiful. As beautiful now as he was at eighteen, at twenty, at twenty two. And Harry can see how he looks at Harry, how he watches Harry’s hand when he plays with his hair, with his necklaces at his chest. He needs to do this, before he loses his nerve. “We broke up.”

“What?” Zayn’s eyes go right to Harry’s face now, all concern. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Harry waves that away. It’s not the problem here. “Do you remember, before you got on that plane, you left me a voicemail?”

Zayn’s gaze is steady, though his lips twist, as if he’s surprised. “Yeah.”

“You said you wanted to talk.”

“Yeah.”

“What were you going to say?”

Zayn’s face is blank, an expressionless mask. It’s not something Harry’d seen before; before, he’d always been easy to read, if you knew him. His heart on his sleeve, Liam had said once, and he’d been right. All his passion, right there. But now there’s nothing. Not on his face. But Harry knows it’s there. He’s seen it, behind Zayn’s eyes, because Zayn can’t really keep it in.

“Don’t ask me that.”

“Why not?” Harry demands. He steps forward, trying to be in Zayn’s space without being threatening—the last thing he needs is to trigger something. “What were you going to say?”

“Just don’t.” Somehow, Zayn’s on the other side of him, walking back towards the living room. Harry follows him in, but he doesn’t sit down, and neither does Zayn. Zayn stays standing, his back against the wall; Harry stands in the middle of the room, facing him. It feels a little like a standoff, one of those old ones in spaghetti westerns.

“Why not?” Harry repeats.

Zayn shoves his hair back again. “ _Please_.” It sounds pulled out of him, like it’s life or death.

Any other time, Harry might answer that plea. Might let it go. But he’s wanted this for ten years, wondered about it for five long, grief-filled years. He doesn’t know when he’s going to get his courage up again. “Why not? If you can give me a good reason, I won’t ask again.”

Zayn looks at him for a long moment, with those big dark eyes, unreadable now. Harry waits. Zayn isn’t who he was and he can’t push him like he once would have, but he needs to know. Needs to know what’s happening behind those eyes, under his sweat-streaked hair, under the chest that rises and falls rapidly, like he’s afraid.

Then Zayn closes his eyes, and opens them again, and his voice is hoarse as he answers. “I’m not safe, Harry. It doesn’t matter what I was going to say.”

Harry walks forward slowly again, his hands clearly where Zayn can see them. Zayn’s weight is shifting, but he can’t tell to where; can’t tell what it means. There’s so much he doesn’t know about Zayn now, and he knows that; knows that Zayn might be telling the actual physical truth when he says he’s not safe. He also knows he doesn’t give a fuck. He’s not missing his chance again.

“I don’t need safe.” Harry’s close now, close enough to put his hands on either side of Zayn’s head. He’s still taller than Zayn. Still broader by a bit, though he can see Zayn’s muscles, and doesn’t know who’s stronger. “What were you going to say?”

Zayn’s eyes dart down to Harry’s lips, just for a second, then back up to Harry’s eyes, and there’s something pleading in that look, something desperate. “You know, Harry.”

It’s enough. Harry leans in slowly, no room for surprises, and then their lips meet and they’re kissing, and it’s not slow anymore. Zayn’s arms are around Harry’s neck, pulling him close, and Harry pushes in, and it’s hot and desperate. It’s a kiss that’s been coming for five years, for ten; the thing between them they’d never named.

“Fuck, Harry,” Zayn murmurs, his lips trailing over Harry’s cheeks, his jaw, his neck. His hands are running up and down Harry’s back, like he’s checking for something, then his lips trail down, to Harry’s throat. “You’re okay, you’re here, you’re safe.”

“I’m here.” Harry cups Zayn’s cheeks, brings him back up to look at Harry. “I’m here.” He doesn’t know what Zayn’s talking about, but it seems like what he needs; he kisses Harry again, and that’s everything Harry needs. He sinks into the kiss, and if he’s trying to get closer it feels like Zayn is too, his grip just a little too tight in a way that makes Harry moan into his mouth.

Harry’s imagined this so many times, late at night when he stopped trying to deny it. In those dreams, Zayn was all hot eyes and smoothness, the sort of dream their fans probably had about him. Harry’d seen Zayn pull girls before, had seen it happen, knew he could be smooth. But this is somehow so much better, the ways Zayn’s fumbling, the way his lips are a little chapped and his lips a little clumsy. It makes sense, Harry thinks, in the part of his mind that isn’t _Zayn ZaynZzayn_ , that isn’t Zayn’s hands Zayn’s lips Zayn’s skin; he’s been alone for five years. He’s been _alone_ for five years.

Let it never be said Harry Styles backs down from pressure. “Been a while?” he teases, grinding slowly into Zayn. Zayn bites back a moan, and his eyes are wide as he looks at Harry, wide and somehow panicked. Like he’s not sure what to do, like he’s still not sure Harry’s real. Did he dream about this, on the island? Harry hopes he did.

“Harry—”

Some other time, Harry would tease, would draw this out. Some other time, maybe he will. But not now. He draws his hands out of Zayn’s hair to fumble with his pants, open them up. Zayn makes a noise that’s probably mostly a growl as Harry gets his hand on his cock, his whole body shuddering, and his head drops down from Harry’s mouth to his shoulder.

“Okay?” Harry asks. He doesn’t—he knows things are weird, with Zayn. He doesn’t want to push.

Zayn lifts his head, and Harry’s dick twitches just at the sight of him, all flushed with his lips swollen and his pupils blown. That look was good on the boy, when Harry’d guiltily stolen a look to the bed next to him one of those burning hot nights in Australia, and seen Zayn between a girl’s legs, his smirk quick and pleased; on the man it’s devastating, almost more so for the bewilderment that seems to be behind it.

“Yeah.” Zayn swallows. “Yeah, it’s good. You’re good.”

“Hey! I’m better than good,” Harry objects, and Zayn smiles, something almost sweet in it, something almost sad.

“You are,” He agrees, and his hand strokes down Harry’s cheek. His finger is rough, calloused, but the touch is gentle, like Harry will break if he presses harder. Harry can’t quite read the look in his eyes, something wistful almost, and Harry just—he hates that look. Hates the sadness Zayn carries with him, hates whatever put it there.

And Harry knows one good way to take it away, at least. He gives Zayn one more long, lingering kiss, then drops to his knees.

“Fuck,” Zayn swears, staring down at him, his eyes big enough it looks like they’re his whole face. “Harry, you don’t have—we can—you should—”

“Do you not want this?” Harry asks, giving his most seductive look. It might fail a little, because he knows he can’t stop smiling—can’t stop squirming a little, because he’s waited ten years for this, give or take.

“Yeah, but you—”

“Want this too,” Harry tells him, and pulls down his sweats. Zayn clearly has come from his workout, because his skin is a bit salty from sweat, and maybe it should be gross but really it’s hot, how Harry can trace each and every muscle, down the hard v line, over the ink at there. For a minute, pressing his lips against DON’T THINK THAT I WON’T, it all feels unreal—feels like Harry is eighteen and putting that ink on Zayn’s hip, pressed close together, watching Zayn’s pupils blow out and his tongue wet his lips and wondering what would happen if he threw caution to the wind and kissed him.

But then Zayn moans, and it’s rougher than it would have been then, deeper, and Harry’s in the present again. He glances up—Zayn’s staring at him, his hands fisted tight at his sides, his knuckles almost white.

“Grab my hair,” he orders, and Zayn slowly unknots his hands to do that, threading through with just the right balance of haste and care. Of course he’d be good at that, Harry thinks vaguely, then he’s finally paying attention to Zayn’s cock and all other thoughts go out the window.

He knows it’s not the best blow job he’s ever given, on his knees on Zayn’s living room floor, with the Rhino probably either watching or having fled, but he doesn’t care, and neither does Zayn apparently, from the way his hips are moving, the ways his hand tightens in Harry’s hair. He stops making noises at some point, and when Harry pulls back to see why, it’s because he’s biting on his hand, hard.

Harry licks his lips, slow and lewd, making sure to keep eye contact. “You don’t have to be quiet.”

Zayn blinks, then looks at his hand like he hadn’t even noticed it. “Oh. I guess, I…”

“There are better things you can be doing with that hand,” Harry informs him pointedly, and Zayn’s lips twist into a smile before it’s swallowed by a groan as Harry goes down on him again. Zayn’s still not loud, not like he was before, when the whole fucking world knew he was getting some—or at least whoever was rooming with him did, or in the room next to him—but there are grunts, and quiet swearing, and it’s almost hotter than that old unabashed noise, the way Harry has to pull each sound from him. It’s so fucking hot and Harry reaches down to shove a hand in his own jeans, jerking himself off to the soundtrack of Zayn’s groans and the slick slide of his mouth.

“Harry,” Zayn warns, tugging on his hair, “I’m, fuck, I’m going to…”

It’s cute that Zayn thinks Harry needs that, he thinks, and keeps sucking. It’s barely seconds later that Zayn comes, his hips stuttering against Harry’s mouth, but barely moving at all. But the expression on his face—if he just looked at Harry like that for a few more seconds, with that intensity, that wonder, Harry wouldn’t need anything else probably.

“Okay?” Harry checks, again. His voice is rough, and he savors the feeling, his hand moving more slowly. He sounds like this because of Zayn. Somewhere, his eighteen year old self is caught between rapture and coming, and doesn’t know why.

“Hm?” Zayn blinks again, then his gaze comes back into focus, and he slides down the wall, so he’s on his knees in front of Harry, and there’s a hand on his hip pulling him closer to Zayn. “Come here.”

“I’m—bloody hell,” Harry swears, and then he’s being kissed and Zayn’s hand is on his cock, jerking him off, and he doesn’t really care he’s not lasting long when he comes into Zayn’s hand, breathing Zayn’s name into his mouth.

Somehow, Harry’s not sure how, he ends up on the couch with Zayn, their legs entangled. It’s lucky it’s a big couch, he thinks almost giddily; they’re too big to fit together on a bunk anymore.

Zayn’s fingers are tracing over his face, down his neck, over the parts of his chest exposed by his open shirt. They’re still mostly dressed, and Harry can’t find it in him to regret it. He’s always liked the fast and intense. And he’s always figured his first time with Zayn, if there was one, would be something like this.

“Hey.” He catches Zayn’s hand in both of his. It’s rough, calloused; Zayn twitches when Harry engulfs it. But it’s nice, to feel Zayn’s hand in his again. He’d always liked holding hands, Zayn had, and Harry had only been too happy to oblige. “What are you thinking?”

Zayn doesn’t smile, quite. But his eyes are soft, and that’s enough for now. “I’m wondering if I’m dreaming.”

“Aw, you dreamed of me?” Harry grins, too happy to be coy.

“Sometimes.” It doesn’t sound like a smiling thing to him. “I never…”

“What did I do in these dreams?” Harry keeps teasing. He lets go of Zayn’s hand to do his own tracing, over Zayn’s cheekbones, the line of his jaw. All those sharp planes, so familiar and so different. “I’m not as bendy as I was at twenty, but I bet I could still manage it.”

Zayn shakes his head, but he doesn’t dislodge Harry’s hand. “You were just…there.”

“There?”

“At home. When I…” Zayn shrugs. “I wasn’t. It didn’t happen often.”

“Aw.” Harry pouts. He used to be able to tease Zayn out of these moods, when he got all existential and broody. “You didn’t hang onto the thought of my ass to get you through five years dry spell?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Why not?” Harry twists, to look at his ass. “It’s a good ass!”

Zayn barely smiles. “It hurt too much. To think of you. Of home.” He hums, and Harry waits, because when Zayn hums like that there’s always more coming. “You couldn’t think about that sort of stuff. It’s dangerous.”

“Oh.” Well, that’s…not what Harry was expecting. He presses his lips to Zayn’s shoulder, then his cheek. “I’m here now.” He takes a breath, but Zayn’s—he doesn’t like to play cards, Harry doesn’t, has never felt the need to take the risk before. But he’s always told himself he would be able to, if he had to. “I always wondered if I’d be here.”

“You did a pretty good job of not letting on.”

“I’m pretty good at not letting on.”

“You are.” Zayn’s chest moves in and out underneath him. “I was pretty sure if I got back, you’d still hate me.”

“What?” Harry pushes himself up, at that, so he can properly look Zayn in the eye.

Zayn doesn’t look away, but it’s not the old aggression in his gaze, the old bravado he used to have whenever someone challenged him. It’s just…calm. Still. “I thought you hated me.”

“I didn’t…” Harry trails off. He hadn’t hated him. He hadn’t liked him very much, but it’s hard to remember back to those awful six months, before the more awful few months that came after it. Hard to remember what Harry had thought of Zayn, before the news splashed across twitter and Harry’s heart had stopped beating. “I’m pretty good at not letting on, I guess.”

“Yeah.” Zayn nods, and Harry lowers himself back down. His hair spreads over Zayn’s chest, over the even sweatier white t-shirt. Zayn’s arm is around his waist, keeping him on the couch, keeping him balanced, his hand at the small of Harry’s back. It feels like it belongs there, like it never left.

He feels so good, though, nestled here against Zayn. It wasn’t even the best sex he’s ever had, not by a long shot, but he feels like he could stretch and purr like a cat.

“It wasn’t five years,” Zayn says suddenly, over Harry’s head.

“Hm?” Harry wants to nap. Zayn was always the best napping partner. He doesn’t know why he’s not settling now; Harry’d always figured he was the type to be out like a light after. He’d certainly never been still on a horizontal surface for more than five minutes without falling asleep.

“The dry spell. It wasn’t…The island wasn’t all abandoned. There was someone, like.”

“Oh?” Harry refuses to let himself tense, to ruin this with jealousy. Or at least, he doesn’t want to let on if he does. “What happened to them?”

Zayn’s voice is flat and bleak, not at all post coital, for all his fingers are twining through Harry’s hair. “She died.”

Harry lets out a long, slow breath. It’s the first time Zayn’s told him anything about the island, really. The first time he’s mentioned someone else there, certainly. That’s probably a good thing, if she hadn’t died and Zayn didn’t sound so utterly emotionless about it. Zayn’s never emotionless. Zayn’s always felt too much, was his problem.

Another breath. Harry’s always been good at compartmentalizing. That is not something to address now. Not for now, between them. He can set that aside, because he’s pretty sure Zayn needs him to. But he needs to say something. He just doesn’t know what. He never doesn’t know what to say.

“Oh,” he says, and grabs at Zayn’s hand again. “I’m here, now.”

“If I’m not dreaming,” Zayn counters, and Harry thinks—or hopes—he can hear a smile in his voice.

\---

_The bar’s all lit up, loud with the sound of sports on the TV and men yelling inside. The noise gets louder as the door swings open, a single man in a dark jacket striding out, then dulls slightly as the door swings shut._

_The man pulls up his collar, then turns his back on the bar. His steps are steady as he walks away, through the dirty streets. A few streetlights blink on and off as he goes, but he doesn’t flinch, like that’s normal. He doesn’t flinch at all, not this big man walking down streets he knows._

_“Who hired you?” The voice comes out of the dark, and now the man does turn, searching for the sound of the voice._

_“The fuck?”_

_The arrow flies out of the dark, imbedding itself just above his head; the Arrow follows a moment later, another arrow on the bow. The man in the dark jacket curses quietly._

_“Who hired you?” the Arrow repeats, implacable. His bowstring is taut._

_The man looks around, but there’s no one. The sound of the bar is very far away; the sounds of traffic even farther._

_“I almost took you down once, I can—” the bowstring twangs, loud, and another arrow grazes his ear. He flinches away from it, away from the Arrow._

_“Who hired you?” The Arrow says a third time, his voice barely more than a whisper. He takes a step forward, and pulls back his bow._

_“I don’t know!” A movement of the bow, and the man raises his hand. “I really don’t, I swear! It was all middlemen and online shit, you know how this works! I’d tell you if I could, it wasn’t worth you coming at me before and it isn’t worth it now! You’re fucking insane, man!”_

_The arrow lands between his legs, and the man swears again. “I’m telling the truth! I can give you the email!”_

_The Arrow stands perfectly still, as the man in front of him quakes._

_“Fine then.” He takes another step forward. “Where was the drop?”_

_The man nods. His face is white. “That I can tell you.”_

\---

“Zayn!” Liam’s grin is almost enough to make Zayn not be annoyed about being here. He’d totally forgotten about Liam’s barbeque really, until Louis had showed up to drag him out. It wasn’t like he could have told Louis that the reason he couldn’t go was that he needed to go to the warehouse to see if he could find something, anything, there to see who would want bombs. Couldn’t tell Louis that he needed to go save people, keep people from being hurt, that he didn’t fucking care about some stupid barbeque when there were important things to be done and he didn’t know how to do _people_ any more. Couldn’t say how he especially didn’t know what to do with the people who’d be there, because he knew Harry would and he didn’t know what to do with Harry, hadn’t known after Harry had left yesterday, citing promo for his new movie. Didn’t know what to do with the guilt about that, too.

He couldn’t say any of that. And more than that, it was hard to say anything even like that, when right on Louis’s heels had come Freddie, who had thrown himself at Zayn and insisted he wanted to play with Uncle Zayn, and did he know that Uncle Liam always had the best ice cream, and he would make sure everyone met Zayn and they would be nice to him, don’t worry. Louis had smirked as Freddie sat on the bed and talked as Zayn got dressed, that asshole.

So now he’s here, even if half his mind is on Harry, and the other half is on those bombs. It’s been a week; the trail’s probably gone cold by now. But what if he’s missing something?

“I’m so glad you’re here!” Liam goes on, beaming like only he can, all crinkled eyes, and Zayn manages a smile back. He’s glad Liam is happy. He is. “I didn’t want to insist or anything, I know you’ve been having a hard time, but it’s so great. Do you want—here—” he reaches out, then pauses, mid going for a hug. Zayn’s not sure how he feels about that. He’s not sure how he’d feel about the hug, but he’s also not sure how he feels about the way the smile on Liam’s face twists, going a little sad. Once, they’d hugged like breathing, Zayn knows. Remembers. Once, Liam had been his best friend, had been the only one who he’d dared approach even months after leaving. Liam had been the one who’d told him to reach out to the others. The one who’d assured him he could. And now he’s not sure if he can hug Zayn, and it’s hurting Liam.

“I’m going to go set Fred playing,” Louis says, pulling gently on Freddie’s arm so he’ll go with him. “Zayn…”

“I’m fine.” He’s not, he hasn’t been fine for five years, but that’s okay. It’s nothing new. “See you later, bro.” he ruffles Freddie’s hair.

“Bye, bro!” Freddie chirps back, and follows Louis.

Zayn follows Liam, lets him show Zayn around. It was supposedly just a small backyard thing, but Liam’s still Liam in a way that’s almost comforting, and so it got bigger than planned rather than not invite anyone. It’s nice that Diana hasn’t reined that part of Liam in at all. Nice that Liam’s so clearly happy, which he is, bouncing around from person to person making sure that they’re all doing well and don’t need more drinks. How he stays close to Zayn, friendly and solicitous, promising more time together, whenever Zayn wants. Whenever he needs it. Offering friendship, clear and simple.

_I’m not your friend, pretty boy. We need each other. That’s all._ Slade had been lying then—or he hadn’t been then, but he had been later, Zayn thinks. And then it had ended with an arrow in a sinking ship. Zayn blinks, shudders, and for a second there’s Liam lying on the metal floor, grimacing up at Zayn in a rictus of rage and insanity, and Zayn is pinning him down, and then it’s Slade’s face too, the man who had kept him alive and taught him to be who he is, and then it’s his father’s and Liam’s again and he’s awake he can’t be having a nightmare now but he can feel his hand curling into a fist and he needs his bow—

The laughter’s loud, even across the crowded backyard and the kids’ yells. Zayn turns toward it almost unconsciously, laughter he’s heard in his dreams for years, that he’s held on to too long, that has no place in the bloody stink of the ship—and there’s Harry.

He’s across the yard, talking to some people Zayn doesn’t know. It’s like a grounding ritual, like bringing Zayn back, for him to stare, to catalog each bit of Harry—long legs in tight jeans, white linen shirt partly unbuttoned so the tan of his chest shows through, a few necklaces resting between his pecs, long hair in its perfect curls blowing a bit in the wind. He looks like a photoshoot, not at all like the images of Harry Zayn had held onto—Harry curled in his bed at two in the morning with a drunken grin on his face, Harry giggling into Zayn’s shoulder, Harry when he was Zayn’s. He’d forgotten that there was this Harry too, who soaked in the attention, who loved the fame and all of the shit that Zayn’s learned means nothing at all, really. Who isn’t just lying by Zayn in the pool, bringing some noise to Zayn’s house. Who isn’t kissing Zayn like his life depends on it, and Zayn doesn’t know what that means, either.

“Wonder when Haz got here,” Liam had clearly followed Zayn’s gaze. “Must have snuck in.” Then he pauses, glances at his wife. “Oh, Diana’s trying to flag me down. Are you okay on your own?”

He looks so worried, Zayn smiles. “I’m fine.” His lips twist, and he knows it’s not quite a smile. “I have grown up.”

Liam raises his hand again, like he’s going to pat Zayn on the back, then looks like he thinks better of it and just nods and smile, then he’s gone. He presses a dramatic kiss to Diana’s lips when he gets to her, as everyone around them laughs, and she blushes a little but laughs too.

Zayn is fine, but he doesn’t want to go into the crowd of people either. He doesn’t know these people—even the ones he once knew he barely had a passing acquaintance with. Louis’s supervising Freddie while chatting with a dark-haired woman that looks like Nadia, his PA; Harry’s still surrounded by people as he always is; he’s lost Niall somewhere. Why is he even here? He doesn’t belong here, in this idyllic backyard with all these happy, successful people. He’s not one of them. He’s nod made for the sun, not anymore. His hands twists on his drink, like it’s a bow. They don’t know the world. Not really. They’ve never had to make the hardest choices.

_Whose life, Malik? Shado or yours? Choose fast, tick tock tick tock—_

_You chose yourself! You selfish bastard—_

“Is there a reason you’re standing here all alone?” Zayn blinks, and he’s off the island, he’s back in the LA backyard, and Niall’s standing in front of him, his brow furrowed, none of his constant smiles there. Because that’s what Zayn does—he hurts people.

Zayn swallows. He has to answer the question. He’s not on the island. “I don’t know anyone.”

Niall nods, like that makes sense, even though unless Niall’s changed distinctly it doesn’t make sense to him at all. “I could introduce you. If you wanted, I mean.”

Zayn doesn’t want, really. He doesn’t want to see the knowing pity in everyone’s eyes.

Niall must see that, because he goes on, “Or you could come help me convince those fuckers,” he nods to the people he must have been talking to before, because they’re looking over at them. “That Hilary’s actually done pretty all right, for the shit hand she was dealt.”

“I don’t exactly know politics, Niall.”

“Exactly! Fresh eyes.” Niall grins, hopeful. “If you’d rather brood that’s fine. But…I thought you might want…”

Fuck. Now Zayn can’t stay here. He nods, and follows Niall over to the conversation.    

As he suspects, he doesn’t have much to contribute. He hadn’t paid much attention to most British politics before the plane crash, let alone American politics, and then he’d had more immediate concerns than what Hilary Clinton was doing in China. But Niall keeps on giving him these hopeful looks, so he can’t just leave. Even if the bombs are out there, or the people who want them. How long has he been here? How much time has he wasted?

“It’s been four years of her, and ISIS is still going strong!” Colin, one of Niall’s LIC friends who’s been transplanted to LA, apparently, insists. He’s a big man, with dark eyes and hair—and when his hand slices insistently through the air Zayn’s arm twitches to block it. It’s not coming near him, or Niall. He knows that. He just has to remind himself of it every time he moves. “She’s refused to commit to ground troops or to an air strike, and so it’s still shit!”

“She’s got reasons for that,” Mary, a bottle blonde with fierce eyes who’s been shooting Niall sidelong looks for the whole conversation, points out. “A ground assault would be long and deadly for a lot of troops.”

“And the air strikes aren’t working!”

“She’s not doing herself any favors with this half-assing.” Zayn hadn’t noticed it came out of his mouth until Niall glances back at him, elbows him gently and slowly.

“What?”

“What did you mean?” Niall asks, loudly enough everyone’s looking at him now.

“Um.” Now he has to say something. “It’s just, you can’t do a ground assault like that halfway, with only a few troops, like she’s doing. You’ve got to do all or nothing.” _If you’re not going to commit with everything, you’re going to die, pretty boy. We go in hard and fast._

“But that’s risking so many more lives!” Mary maintains loudly.

Zayn looks at her, with her manicure and careful makeup and designer clothes. She has no idea.

“That’s war,” he says simply. “That’s how you win.”

Mary’s mouth opens and closes again.

“Well, did you hear Trump’s latest plan?” Niall asks, laughing in that nervous way he always did when the conversation gets awkward. “Apparently, because he knows Congress won’t fund his camps, he’s going to fund them himself.”

“Him and some investors, right?” Mary jumps back in, though she’s pointedly not looking at Zayn anymore. “That’s so freaky. That he thinks it’ll happen.”

“It’s not ridiculous.” Colin holds up his hands when he gets glares. “Not the idea of it, but that it’ll pass! People are scared. Trump’s big business friends are scared, and they’ve got money. If there isn’t the funding argument…”

“Aren’t you glad the world fixed itself when you were gone?” Niall asks Zayn, joking. Zayn smiles, like he’s laughing at the joke, but. The bombs are still out there. Charles’s list is still out there, and the catastrophe Zayn can’t see but has to stop. People are in danger in so many ways, and Zayn needs to stop what he can.

“I swear he wasn’t this crazy in 2016,” Mary shakes her head, fiddling with the ends of her hair as they swish across her neck. “Like, he was crazy, but not like this.”

“I think it’s that new advisor he has.” Niall nods. His gaze is following her fingers at her neck, and given the curve of Mary’s lips, Zayn thinks she’s noticed. “Maude whatshername. Have you heard the shit she says? It’s even more than Trump.”

“I think Trump’s just crazy,” Colin disagrees. He tips his chin back to take the final drink from his beer. “I’m getting another. Anyone?”

“I’m good.” Mary’s not looking away from Niall.

Niall darts a look at Zayn. “I’m good too. Zayn?”

He hasn’t been away that long. And he’d love to escape too. “I’ll get another one, yeah.”

“Awesome. Come on, Malik.” Colin’s hand comes down fast, and Zayn’s dodging before he can think, just sees the hand coming at him and his hand is at his belt for a knife that isn’t there and—

“Let’s leave these two alone,” Colin keeps going. If he noticed Zayn dodging he doesn’t say anything. Niall’s too busy looking at Mary to notice.

They get their drinks, and Colin tries to make small talk for a little while longer before Zayn’s inability to do so means he goes away. Zayn wanders away from the drinks too. There’s a tree in the corner of the yard, where Zayn can put his back to it and see the whole yard. It’s not high ground, but it’s enough. He can breathe here.

“Uncle Zayn!” He catches Freddie when he leaps at him, juggling his drink out of the way. “Uncle Zayn, come on, the ice cream is here!”

“Sorry.” Harry’s behind Freddie, and Zayn looks at him for just a second. He’s no better up close. No less gorgeous, and no less something Zayn has no right seeing. He has a girlfriend. He has someone sweet and nice and good for him. He shouldn’t think about Zayn. “He’s excited to show it off.”

“Come on!” Freddie insists, imperious. “Daddy said I could have two whole scoops. And then Uncle Harry always lets me steal some of his.” He squirms until Zayn puts him down again, though he doesn’t let go of Zayn’s hand.

“Oh does he?”

“He does not!” Harry protests. He’s dimpling as he shoots a look at Zayn, one Zayn can’t quite read. “Or, not if Louis asks.” Zayn raises his eyebrows. “It’s all natural, and not as unhealthy as most ice creams! It’s good for him.” Zayn keeps looking, and Harry laughs again. “And I like being his favorite uncle. I am, right?” he asks Freddie.

“Yep! You and Uncle Niall and Uncle Liam and Uncle Zayn and Uncle Ernest.”

“Hey!” Harry complains. Freddie’s tugging on Zayn’s hand, so he lets him lead him back towards the food, where Diane is setting out some ice creams. “You just met Uncle Zayn.”

“But he’s cool.” Freddie grins up at Zayn.

“He is,” Harry agrees. “The coolest.”

There’s a note there—but Zayn shouldn’t think that. He doesn’t have the right to. He’ll only hurt Harry.

Zayn watches as Freddie shows him the correct way to get ice cream, and the best flavors, then he clambers onto Zayn’s lap to eat his. It’s sweet, almost too sweet after too long without that much sugar. Zayn doesn’t think he’ll be able to get the whole thing down.

Harry eats with them, but it’s mainly listening to Freddie ramble about the slide and how his tooth is loose and how he’s going to see the new Star Wars movie soon. He’s a good buffer. Means Harry and Zayn can’t talk about the thing floating between them, about how everything that had simmered for five years had broken.

“You know who really loves Star Wars?” Harry says, leaning close like it’s a secret. Freddie’s face contorts as he thinks, but Harry goes on before he gets too confused. “Uncle Zayn. He loves Star Wars.”

“Really?” Freddie turns big, astonished eyes on Zayn.

He had, once. Like he’d loved his comic books. The fight against good and evil, like it’s that easy. The dark side and the light. Zayn supposes there’s a comfort in that, somehow still. That in a galaxy far far away, the world makes sense, and good people don’t die for no reason, and sometimes death is the only answer.

“Yeah,” Zayn answers. “Who’s your favorite?”

“Rey!” Freddie says excitedly. Rey? Zayn doesn’t remember…

“The new trilogy,” Harry whispers, and Zayn nods. Right, he remembers that was coming out before his plane went down.

“Who’s yours?” Freddie demands. It’s a test, Zayn’s pretty sure, from Freddie’s narrow-eyed look.

It had used to be Han Solo. Zayn had liked the rebelliousness, the need for action. Now…

“I like Luke,” Zayn says, slowly. He drums his fingers on his leg. He wants his bow. “But I haven’t seen the new movies.”

“Really!” Freddie’s eyes go big. “You can watch with us! I’ll go ask daddy!” he jumps off of Zayn’s lap and takes off. Zayn watches until he gets to Louis and Louis swings him up into his arms, then he turns back to find Harry just looking at him. This is where they talk, Zayn supposes. Where Harry tells him what Zayn knows, that he was just shaken from breaking up with his girlfriend, that it was the remnants of whatever had been between them years ago. Where Zayn agrees, because that’s how Harry will be safe. Because Zayn will ruin him.

“You’re good with him.” It’s not what Zayn was expecting. But Zayn will take it. Zayn will delay the conversation, or ignore it. He’s learned how to do that, when the unspoken is better. If being the Arrow taught him nothing else, it’s taught him that lies are best, sometimes.

Zayn shrugs. “Kids are easy.”

“You always were good with babies,” Harry agrees, with a little smile. “Are you okay with the rest of it?”

“Hm?”

“With being here.” Harry gestures around. “You look—well not bad, because you’re you, but uncomfortable.”

Zayn shakes his head slowly. He thinks he can say it, to Harry. “People aren’t easy, anymore.” It’s barely a part of it, really. He can’t tell Harry about how he’s different from all of them. About how he doesn’t belong here, how he belongs out there looking for bombs, with other people who have the violence in them. How he should never pick Freddie up, because he’s killed people with those hands. About how friendship doesn’t make sense anymore, not really.

“Zayn.” Harry’s hand is on his on the table. Zayn looks down at it. It’s big, always has been. Zayn could break his finger in a second. Could jam this spoon in his eye and watch him bleed to death. He’s done it before—not the spoon, but the eye. He hadn’t flinched. But this is just the warmth of a hand. Harry’s not a threat. Not a threat, he reminds himself. “Do you need to leave?”

Zayn takes a breath. He does. “I’m fine.”

“That’s not what I asked.” Harry’s still looking at him, so intently Zayn could almost imagine he can understand. But he can’t. No one can. Zayn’s just as alone here as he was on the island. “Would you like to leave? I can drive you.”

Zayn blinks at Harry. Harry, in his flowing shirt and no smile to be found, who was talking and laughing with everyone just minutes ago. Who loves it here. Who always had loved it here, surrounded by people, in a way Zayn had never been able to do, and could even less now. “You should stay.”

“That’s not…” Harry rolls his eyes. “Look, Freddie’s going to crash soon. You can go home with Louis then, if you don’t want me to take you.”

He pushes up, but Zayn flips his hand, grabs at Harry’s. He just…he heard the note in Harry’s voice, and he…the last time he left something like that, it was five years before he got it back. “It’s not…you don’t want to leave. It’s not that I don’t want you to take me.”

“Zayn.” Harry’s hand twitches in his, like he’s going to reach out, and his eyes go soft. “I’ll go talk to Louis.”

“Yeah.” Zayn pulls his hand back. “Thanks.”

He watches as Harry heads over to Louis, leans in to whisper something in his ear. They both turn to look at Zayn, and then say some more things. If Zayn wanted to, he might be able to read their lips, but it’s not worth it. He doesn’t want to know what they’re saying about him.

\---

Fifteen minutes later he and Louis are leaving, a sleepy looking Freddie trailing after Louis. Liam makes a sad face at them, but Louis just barrels through, then they’re outside again, on the other side of Liam’s house.

The car pulls up in front of them almost as soon as they step outside. “That was fast,” Louis hums, and helps Freddie into the car, then slides in after him.

Zayn eyes the car. It’s a normal car service sort of car, the same as they’ve used a thousand times. Black sedan, the driver covered by tinted windows. Nothing should be wrong.

He glances over his shoulder at the house. He can still hear the sounds of people. Nothing has happened back there. But the back of his neck is prickling, and he can’t tell why. It’s probably just how on edge he’s been all day, the tension of him and Harry and all the people adding up to paranoia.

And even if it isn’t, it’s probably best that they get home quickly. That’s always safest. He slides into the car after Louis, and shuts the door.

Freddie’s fussy, whining at Louis about how he wants more ice cream, how he’s tired, how he wanted to stay. Louis’s patient as he replies to it, more patient than he ever is with anything over the age of seven, but Zayn keeps drumming on his knee, glancing at the streets outside. This car ride can’t go fast enough. He didn’t think he was that keyed up from being around so many people, but maybe that’s just what this discomfort is.

_Never discount instinct, pretty boy. You know how to hunt. So your body knows when it’s being hunted. Listen to it._

Zayn catches a street sign, as they take a turn. “Louis?” he asks, squinting at it. “Is this the way back?”

“What? No Fred, we can’t have ice cream when you get back, it’s almost bedtime. You need—”

“Louis,” Zayn repeats, more urgently. The car is slowing down. “Is this the way back?”

“What are you…” Louis leans back to look out the window. “Fuck, no. It’s not. Hey!” he calls, rapping on the partition. “What’s—”

Louis’s cut off by the car slamming to a stop and the seat belt jerking against his neck. Zayn’s already unbuckling his and leaning across him to lock the door when the door’s jerked open, and there’re two men in dark masks there.

“What do you want?” Louis demands, grabbing at Freddie’s arm to pull him closer, but they don’t answer. One of them shoves hard at Louis, so he’s thrown back against Zayn; the other grabs Freddie’s waist, and pulls him away from Louis. “Freddie! What—no—”

“Daddy?” Freddie asks, clearly confused.

“Fred!” Louis’s diving forward, but there’s another man in the way; the driver, if Zayn had to guess.

“Daddy!” Freddie wails, and his face is drawn and terrified as the men step away, and turn.

For a second, Zayn’s frozen. No one can know. No one can know about him, or what he’s learned; people knowing could jeopardize the mission. Could put a thousand thousand lives at risk, if Zayn doesn’t manage Charles’s mission. Zayn cannot let anyone know. Secrecy. Widening the circle only risks the goal. Means trusting too many other people.

“Daddy!” Freddie cries again, and Zayn can feel Louis shaking against him. The man holding him is getting farther away. “Where are we going? Daddy!”

And Zayn’s hand is on his own door, shoving it open. He doesn’t even know what’s happening, but no one is taking Freddie away. Not this boy who’s smiled so trustingly at him. Not Louis’s son. Not another person he cares about.

“Zayn, what are you doing!” Louis yells, but Zayn pulls himself out of the door, then he’s around the car before the man blocking them can do anything. He’s easy; Zayn grabs the back of his head and smashes it into the car, then shoves him to the ground. He doesn’t look back as he sprints after the other two men, one of them holding a screaming Freddie. He doesn’t know where they are; they must have been taken somewhere deserted. It doesn’t much matter. It might even be better. No one will hear these men scream.

They’d looked back at his footsteps, but it doesn’t help them. Zayn’s tackled the first man before he can do anything, punches his nose so it cracks under Zayn’s fist, then rolls to his feet. The other man’s hampered by Freddie’s flailing, but so is Zayn—he’s got a built in shield. They circle, but Zayn can’t get Freddie free, can’t risk him being put in the way of his strike. He needs his bow, he needs something…

The man’s eyes flick over his shoulder, and Zayn whirls in time to block an oncoming strike with his forearm. A glint of metal is in the man’s hand, metal and blood from his nose. The man pushes forward, his leg sweeping out, and Zayn’s still trying to avoid the knife so he fumbles and goes down to one knee. The man lashes out with the knife; Zayn catches it on his arms. But the other man has leverage, is taller and probably stronger, and Zayn’s arms falter for a second.

Behind him, the man with Freddie is leaving, running. Fuck.

Zayn drops his arms and dodges left. The man crashes down next to him, and this time Zayn rolls on top of him and smashes his head back. He can still hear footsteps and the other man must be fleeing and he will not take Freddie, he will not—Zayn grabs the knife out of the man’s hand, pivots, and throws.

The man holding Freddie falls to his knees. Freddie hits at his back, unconsciously spreading the pain of the knife in his back. “Let me go!” he demands, and Zayn’s up again, running forward.

He gets to Freddie just as the man collapses, pulling him up into his arms over the rabbit-fast beating of Zayn’s heart, the rush of adrenaline.

“Uncle Zayn!” Freddie wails, and buries his head in Zayn’s shoulder.

“Hey,” Zayn murmurs, stroking a hand over his hair. “Hey, you’re okay. Nothing’s going to happen to you.” One of the men on the ground, the one with the knife in his back, whimpers. Zayn ignores him, brings Freddie closer so he can make sure he’s not facing the men on the ground. He remembers the first time he saw a man die, Slade’s knife in his throat. Can feel the puke burning his throat even now. He doesn’t want Freddie to remember this. “I promise, you’re fine.” He’ll make sure of it, whatever it takes.

“Give me my son.”

Zayn turns. Louis’s standing in front of him, between the men on the ground. He’s got the look in his eyes Zayn knows too well means he’s standing on a precipice, and his hands are shaking, though they’re clenched into fists. Zayn eyes him. He doesn’t know what Louis saw.

“I don’t care if you can kill me right now.” Louis’s voice is cold and hard. Zayn has a sudden memory of telling Louis he was leaving. Of the look he’d given Zayn then. “Give me my son.”

“I’m not going to kill you.” But Zayn hands Freddie over, detangling his hands from Zayn’s hair. He immediately grabs onto Louis, continuing to sob. It’s the only sounds in the empty street, that and Louis’s quiet hum as he holds Freddie close.

“Lou—” Zayn starts. He needs—he needs to know what Louis’s going to do, first off. Needs to know how much damage control this will engender. Then, he needs to find whoever is threatening Freddie, and kill them as slowly and painfully as he knows how—and he knows how to kill very painfully.

“Is he dead?” Louis glances down at the man between them. He’s gone quiet.

Zayn follows his gaze, judges the knife. “No.”

“Is he in pain?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Very deliberately, Louis presses his foot on the knife. The man moans. Louis doesn’t smile, but there’s a hint of something Zayn recognizes too well in his eyes. He should have known. They were always too alike in the most dangerous ways. “Okay. Let’s go home.”

“Louis—”

“He needs to get home,” Louis says, firmly. “And I—fuck. I need to get home too.”

“Yeah, okay.” It’s only when Louis raises his other hand to wrap around Freddie that Zayn notices it’s still shaking. He supposes for someone like Louis, this is traumatic. He isn’t used to blood.

Zayn drives them home in silence. Louis sits in the back with Freddie, still holding him close. He doesn’t look at Zayn at all.

When Zayn pulls up in front of Louis’s house, he pauses. “I—”

“Drive yourself home. Can you ditch the car, or whatever we have to do?” Louis opens the door, gently pulls Freddie out. He’s fallen asleep—cried himself to sleep, maybe.

“Louis.”

“I’ll talk to you later, don’t worry.” Louis snorts mirthlessly.

“No, Louis.” Zayn puts the car in park, turns around. Louis’s clutching at Freddie like he’ll die if he lets go, and he’s got a bit of wildness in his gaze, but Zayn can’t let that influence him. He has a mission. There are things more important than them. “What are you going to say about this?”

“Is that a threat?” Louis asks, his eyes narrowing. Then he shakes his head. “Don’t answer that yet. I’m not saying anything about this until I’ve processed it, and I’m sure Freddie’s okay. Then—then we’ll definitely be talking.”

He doesn’t look like he’s lying, and Zayn’s always been able to tell when Louis’s lying.

“Okay.” Zayn nods, and taps his finger on the wheel. Louis looks at it, and goes a little pale. Huh. There’s blood. Zayn wipes it off on his shirt. “Tell me if Freddie needs anything.” 

Louis snorts. “Yeah, sure.”

The door slamming is a very definitive ending to the conversation. Zayn still sits and watches until Louis and Freddie disappear behind their gate before he pulls away.  

 


	6. Chapter 5

Zayn spends the night out at the warehouse, and the morning downstairs, just the hood and the bow, the workout equipment. Just sweat and blood and frustration. The warehouse was a bust. He doesn’t know what Louis’s going to do. _A person who knows your secret is a weakness. Weaknesses get you killed_. But he’s not going to kill Louis. And Slade had said that but he hadn’t meant it, because he kept Zayn alive. _We’ll make a predator of you yet_.

But he won’t know what to do with that until Louis talks to him. He can’t make a plan, so he shouldn’t dwell. _Don’t think, react. You think too much, pretty boy, until you don’t think at all._ It’s always been what he did. Harry’d told him something similar, once. That he brooded and brooded and then did whatever he wanted anyway. Some things don’t change, he supposes.

And then there’s Harry. Zayn leaves the salmon ladder behind, goes to pick the bow up, to drag his fingers over it. He touched Harry with those fingers, had held Freddie. He’d killed men with those fingers. He’d beaten them to get information.

He lets out a long breath, and strings the bow. He needs to focus. Harry is a distraction. He always has been. Even when Zayn never thought this was possible, back when he was eighteen and they were doing their dance, always coming close but never touching; back in those six months before the plane crash when Zayn just wanted Harry to call him back, to talk to him. To understand, because he’d thought Harry could. He’d been a distraction then too, something that wasn’t the music, wasn’t Zayn’s real life. And he isn’t Zayn real life now, either.

Fiercely, as savagely as he’d ever done, Zayn pushes back the memory of Harry’s lips, his body, his smile... Instead, Zayn stands, closes his eyes. Then he draws, and shoots, and smiles when he opens his eyes to see the dummy with an arrow in its heart.

He shoots for a while, then he sits down with his computer. The warehouse had been empty. Nothing there. He wasn’t surprised, really; it’d been weeks. He doesn’t know what he wanted to find. But it did look like it was meant for storage, not for a meet—Zayn might not have a lot of experiences with meets that aren’t in island tents or on beaches, but there are some constants. _A meet is always an ambush. Or if it isn’t, you should make it one_. And the warehouse was the worst possible location for an ambush, on either side.

But there wasn’t any evidence of who owned it, no records. No trail for Zayn to follow, for who wanted bombs in LA. He’d done a thorough search last night, trying not to think about Freddie’s screams, but nothing. And he couldn’t go back to the people hired for the attack; they didn’t know any more. Then there’s always the question of that transfer, so shoddily guarded…

The ring of the doorbell is loud enough Zayn’s bow is in his hand before he realizes. Then he takes another breath, as Rhino’s barking comes through the ceiling. Just someone here. Just…he glances at the monitor for the security camera. Just Louis here. Fuck.

Zayn heads upstairs, as the buzzer goes again. And again. And again. Louis’s hand is pressed against the bell one more time, when Zayn yanks the door open.

“Is Freddie all right?” He needs to know that, first.

Louis steps in, and Zayn shuts the door behind him. “He’s okay. As okay as he can be. Zayn—”

“Good.” Zayn turns away, walking deeper into the house, toward the living room, before he stops and diverts to the kitchen. He doesn’t want to have this conversation. But he especially can’t have it in the living room, with the wall Harry had kissed him against right there. He’s not thinking about that. It’s the best way to keep Harry safe. I’m glad he’s safe.”

“Because you got him. That was four men, Zayn. Big guys. And you just…” Louis shakes his head. Zayn can’t quite read the emotion on his face, what he thinks about that. “They didn’t stand a chance, did they?”

“No.”

“Where did you learn that? You definitely couldn’t do that in the band.”

Zayn shrugs. “I stayed alive for five years.” _We will never be as large as Slade, you and I._ Shado’s voice now. _So we have to be fast, and we have to be fierce, and most of all, we must know where to hit_. “No bodyguards on the island.”

“So now you’re what, a badass?” Zayn shrugs again. He’s not sure what he is. Or maybe he is, but he doesn’t want to say it. Not to Louis, leaning against the counter staring Zayn down, like he’s the most intimidating person Zayn’s ever seen. “Or the Arrow?”

Shit. He’d known he’d run the risk, but still. “Louis. Don’t be stupid.” Zayn meets Louis’s eyes. He’s not Fyers, not Ivo. Zayn has lied to much more dangerous men than him.

“I’m not stupid,” Louis snaps—always a sore spot with him. The vulnerability he doesn’t hide well enough. Zayn wonders if he knows. If he’s figured out how dangerous that chink in his armor is. “You come back to LA, some sort of ninja, and then right away a masked vigilante pops up? I literally talked to the Arrow, I don’t know how I didn’t guess.”

Zayn snorts. “I just beat up a few guys to keep Freddie from being kidnapped. Doesn’t mean I’m the Arrow.”

“It doesn’t not mean it, either.” Louis crosses his arms. “I know I’m right, Zayn. You’ve never been able to lie to me.”

That’s a lie too, really. Zayn’s always been a good liar. It used to be omission, but now it’s more than that. _You’re a performer, pretty boy, right? Perform. Convince him of what you need, and we’ll get by_.

“I’m not the Arrow, come on.” Zayn laughs, rolls his eyes. “Me? Honestly?”

“I know you.” Louis keeps on glaring. “I know you, and somehow my son is wrapped into this.”

Zayn sighs. Louis’s always been too stubborn for his own good. “What do you want, Louis?” he holds up his hands, palms out. Calloused palms, archer’s hands. Muscles around the forearms from the pulling of the bow. If Louis knew how to look, those arms would tell him everything.

Louis puts his hands down on the counter. “I want the truth, Zayn.” His voice is sharp. “I’ve only ever wanted the truth.”

Zayn wasn’t going to tell anyone. He shouldn’t tell anyone. He certainly isn’t going to tell his family, or Harry, with his bright eyes and the way he touched Zayn like he was precious. He needs to keep them safe. He needs to keep Louis safe too, but Louis’s seen him. Louis’s got the idea in his head, and if he started talking to people…

There was a time when Zayn would have trusted Louis with his life. A time when they were partners. _Know why I kept you alive, Malik? It’s not because I liked you. It’s not because you were useful, because we both bloody well know that wasn’t true. It was because it was better to have you on my side than blabbing to who knows who._

He thinks of Louis, pushing in that knife. Louis had always understood—not like Zayn does now, but he gets it. It had been the problem between them, once. Now… Louis can’t have changed that much. Louis is still Louis, and he’ll still understand.

“Come on.” He shoves away from the counter, and heads into the hallway. He angles himself carefully, so that Louis can’t see the code he presses into the keypad to get downstairs, then presses his thumb onto the biometric lock that pops up. Only once that’s activated does the door swing open, and he goes downstairs, Louis following close on his heels.

“Is this like a Doctor Who thing?” he asks, as Zayn pads down the stairs. “Is it going to be—shit.” He stops talking when they get to the basement, and his eyes go a little wide, like they had the first time they played stadiums. He turns slowly, his eyes flitting over the dummies, the salmon ladder, the targets. The trunk, weatherbeaten and old; the bow that lies on the table where Zayn had left it. It’s far away, Zayn thinks. If Louis decides he’s going to go tell his secret to everyone, it’ll be too far away. He’ll have to subdue him here first.

It’s probably not the best thing to think about your friend, he realizes. But Louis is silent as he takes it in, and Louis is never silent. And this can’t get out. Zayn won’t let it. He’d thought he could trust Louis—but if he’s wrong—

But then, “You’ve got a batcave!” Louis crows, grinning, and heads over to the dummies. “This is awesome!”

“It’s not a batcave.”

“It’s totally a batcave,” Louis retorts, poking at the nearest dummy. “Or, I don’t know, an Arrow cave? That doesn’t sound right. We’ll figure it out.” He moves on from the target dummy to a punching bag, then stands under the salmon ladder. “What’s this for?”

“You climb it.”

“Like, each side?”

“No, with a bar. It goes…” Zayn shakes his head. “Look up salmon ladder online.”

“Whatever.” Louis continues his circle of the room. Because he’s Louis, he touches everything, poking and prodding, trying out the weights, dragging his finger over the trunk. Zayn follows, quiet. It’s only when he reaches for the bow that Zayn snatches it away.

“Hey!”

“You’ll just hurt yourself,” Zayn tells him. It’s true, he supposes. But he doesn’t like the idea of Louis touching the bow. Shado’s bow.

Louis’s nose wrinkles in the way that always used to mean that he was just putting that argument aside until later. “And you can seriously shoot that?”

“You saw me shoot it.”

“I saw the Arrow shoot it,” Louis retorts, raising his eyebrows in a dare. “You could still just be a serious fanboy. I know you’re a serious fanboy. So how do I—oh, hell.”

Zayn lowers the bow. The arrow is in the dummy’s eye. “Still wondering?”

“Shit.” Zayn takes a little pleasure in the way Louis’s jaw drops. “Wow, that’s weird.”

“Weird?”

“That you…” Louis trails off. He’s still staring at the dummy, and some of the excitement’s faded as reality sets in. “Have you killed people?”

Zayn’s grip tightens on the bow, reflexively. “Do you want me to answer that?”

It’s an answer, and they both know it. Louis turns his gaze to Zayn, and there’s something in it Zayn’s never seen before. Fear. Fear of who Zayn is now. Fear of what he could do. Louis’s felt a lot of things towards Zayn, he knows, but it’s never been this. He’s right to feel it, though. He should be afraid of Zayn. _Everything you love dies_ , he hears in Shado’s voice, though she’s never said it outside his nightmares. _It’s all your fault she’s dead!_ That Slade had said, bleeding from the arrow Zayn had shot, and he’d been right.

“Will…” Louis starts slowly. He glances at the dummy again, then back at Zayn, with that aggressive bravado that he uses to cover up the fear. “Does this have anything to do with what happened with Freddie? Did you put my son in danger?”

“No.” Zayn pushes his hair back. That’s the loose thread still. There are plenty of reasons for people to try to kidnap Louis Tomlinson’s child, money being the most important of those, though Louis’s got enough connections that there could be others. But this was planned, a driver planted, Louis’s movements stalked. It wasn’t a crime of opportunity. And it’s the second time Louis’s been attacked, or people close to him. “I just saved him.”

Louis nods, sharply. “So. What are you working on?”

“What?”

“Do you really think I’m going to learn that my best friend’s a superhero and I’m not going to get in on it? It’s like you don’t know me at all.” Louis throws himself in the chair, spins it around. He’s still got the insouciance that means he’s processing and covering up his emotions, but the grin he shoots at Zayn dares him to call him on it. “What is your mission? Why did you attack that truck? Did you steal something?”

“You believe me?” It’s a stall, but Zayn’s not sure what to do. He never meant someone to be with him. He never meant to reconnect with any of these boys, never thought he’d have this unquestioning loyalty that Louis gives his family again. He didn’t plan for this. He’d meant to do it alone. To keep everyone safe.

Louis’s grin fades, just a bit, to show the vulnerability beneath it. “You came back to life, Zayn. I can believe anything after that.” He spins the chair again, and when he faces Zayn the smirk is back. “And I’m storing this up to brag to Liam. I’m totally in a batcave.”

“You can’t tell Liam. You can’t tell anyone, Louis.” Zayn can hear the coldness in his voice. That’s the bottom line. “No one.”

“I know, I know. I’ve read the comics, Zed. I know how being a secret keeper works, I was joking.” Louis waves a hand. “You aren’t going to tell Harry, then?”

“Why would I tell Harry?” Harry’s mouth against his lips. Harry’s hands on him, gentle but insistent. The kiss that he’d waited for so long for. Those few hours, like a dream that Zayn doesn’t get. _Selfish bastard._

“Right. Why would you tell Harry. I certainly don’t know.” Louis snorts, then sobers. “They’re going to find out. You’ve never been able to keep a secret.”

“I can now.”

Louis studies him for a second, that incongruous glimpse of the man underneath his performance. “Yeah, I can see that. But now you’ve told me, so we can do that together. What are we working on?”

_You were useless once, pretty boy. Keeping you close made you useful. More than useful, maybe._

_We all have different strengths, Zayn. Slade is not you. I am not you. We learn to use our strengths, and to use the strengths of our allies. That is how a battle is won. How a war is won._

“Bombs.” Zayn sets his bow down, leans against the table. “There were bombs on the truck, and someone wanted them.” He explains what happened, as far as he can tell, to Louis’s narrow-eyed gaze. Just saying it does feel good, laying out the path—and it does sound weird. He knows it’s off, something not gelling.

“But the warehouse is a dead end,” Zayn finishes, finally. “I can’t figure out who was supposed to take ownership of the bombs there. And if I can’t find out who, I can’t find out where.”

“I can.”

“What?” Zayn demands. Louis is many things, but he’s not smarter than Zayn. He’s not trained like Zayn. “Why can you?”

Louis smirks, his old ‘I know something you don’t know’ smirk. “Because, Zayn, I know something you never figured out.”

“Louis.”

Louis’s still smirking, as he leans back in his seat. For a moment, it feels like the two of them eight years ago, playing one of their pranks, as Louis laid out the plan. “You always follow the money.”

\---

Harry stretches, as luxuriously as he can. He loves morning yoga, loves how it settles things in his bones, how the sun sinks into him. The only thing better, he thinks, would be if Zayn were here with him.

He smiles at the thought of Zayn. He hasn’t seen him since the barbeque, has just been too busy and Zayn seems to be needing time to himself to regroup, but he’s still buzzing with it. With Zayn. He knows what Zayn’s dick tastes like now. He knows the sounds Zayn makes when he’s about to come. Well, he’d known that before, but now he knows what he sounds like when he’s about to come because of Harry. He’ll head over soon, see if Zayn wants breakfast. See what else they can do.

His phone rings, and Harry lies back down on the mat to stare up at his ceiling as he answers. “Hey.”

“Tell mum she’s being ridiculous.”

“Hi to you to, my darling sister.”

“Yes, hi. Tell mum she’s being ridiculous.”

Harry laughs. “What did she do?”

“Do you need to know?”

“If you want me to take your side.”

“She’s making a fuss about us going to Greg’s for Christmas.”

Harry makes a face at the ceiling. “Well, it is Christmas. I can see why she wants you there.”

“She got Christmas last year! Greg’s parents were plenty pissed about that, I’ll tell you. I’m still hearing about it.” He can hear something creak, and Gemma’s on her feet, probably pacing. “It’s only going to get worse when there are kids, that’s going to be a mess. We’ll be driving the whole length of London to see both families. I don’t want to do that yet.”

“It is Christmas.”

“Yes, you said.” Gemma huffs. “I need you to call mum and tell her she’s being ridiculous. Be a good boy, now.”

Harry chooses his words carefully. “I wouldn’t say she’s being ridiculous, Gem.”

“Oh, so you’re on her side! I should have known!”

“No!” Harry corrects her, before she can start really ranting. Once Gemma gets going, nothing can stop her. Sometimes he wonders if she got all the pushiness in the family. “No, you’ve got a point too.”

“Oh, very useful Harry. I’m so glad I called you.”

Harry rolls his eyes, and sits up. The sun is risen, and apparently his day has started, according to his sister. “Why don’t I just fly everyone somewhere for the holidays? Greg’s family too. We can all do it together.”

He can almost hear Gemma’s reluctance to admit that he had a good idea, but at last, she sighs. “Yeah, that might work. I’ll run it by Greg. Might be a trip, getting them to agree to take your money.”

“I’m pretty sure I can afford it.”

“Yeah, they’re just not used to living off of your charity like I am. You doing okay?”

Harry grins, at her quick change of subject, and heads out of his yoga studio towards his bedroom. That part of the house is finished, at least. He thinks. There might be a few new things he can add. “I’m good.”

“How’s Zayn doing?”

Warmth rises in Harry at just his name. “He’s doing well. Or, like, better.”

“Good. Send him my love and all. I need to get going, though. A lot more battles to fight.” Gemma pauses, then adds, “And you’re still an asshole for not taking my side.”

“I didn’t take mum’s side either!” Harry protests, but Gemma snorts.

“Not choosing a side doesn’t count. Anyway, I’ll talk to you later, see if this thing’ll work. Love you.”

“Love you,” Harry tells her, and then she hangs up.

Harry sets his phone on the bed, and strips off his sweaty shorts. One crisis averted, and it’s not even ten yet. It’s on track to be a good day.

\---

_“You killed her!” Slade yells, and Zayn shakes his head, his bow steady. “You killed Shado!”_

_“No, I tried—”_

_“You chose yourself!” Slade yells again, his hands waving in the air, the dull metal of the gun a flash in the darkness of the tanker’s hold. Elsewhere, Zayn knows, the boat is filling up fast with water, fast fast fast and he’ll drown, gasping for air and his lungs burning. His oldest nightmare. “You should have saved her!”_

_“I would have—” Zayn tries to say, but his voice doesn’t work, he doesn’t have a voice. Nothing to say, nothing to give._

_“You’re a selfish bastard, Zayn Malik,” Slade goes on, and now his gun steadies, point it right at Zayn’s heart. “You don’t love anyone. You didn’t love her. Not enough to die for her.”_

_Zayn’s voice still isn’t working, and now his arms aren’t either, he can’t draw his bow, he drew his bow last time, that’s what he did, he drew his bow and shot Slade through the eye before Zayn died, but the madness right out of his reddened, mira kuru crazed eyes. “Would you have died for me?” His face shifts, and then it’s Zayn’s father with Slade’s crazed eyed, “For me? For any of us?” Then it’s Niall’s face, and “you said we were brothers, Zed? Wouldn’t you die for that?” And then it’s Shado, Shado again, Shado with blood streaming from her throat, “I’d be alive if you hadn’t loved me,” She says, and reaches out._

_Zayn draws his bow, points it at her. “It isn’t you. I tried to save you!” his mouth forms the words, but they don’t come out. “I would have died for you!”_

_“You’re just a selfish bastard, pretty boy,” Slade says, and his hand cocks on the gun and Zayn fires the arrow, and it flies true true true and then he’s on the floor, and Zayn’s running to him, and there are tears on his faith and the ground or maybe it’s that the ground is wet, filling with water._

_Slade’s eyes are open, clear, and he reaches up a hand, his face almost confused, as if he doesn’t know what happens. Zayn’s hands are covered in blood. “Zayn?” he asks, squinting._

_“Yeah, it’s me.” Zayn leans forward. He deserves to have his last words heard. Deserves to die with a friend._

_Then Slade’s eyes focus, and his hand closes around Zayn’s neck, tight enough he can’t breathe. “This is all your fault,” he hisses, his hand like a vice, and the water is washing over Zayn and he’s drowning but he can still hear Slade’s voice. “If you weren’t so selfish, none of this would have happened.”_

Zayn can’t breathe. He can’t breathe, he’s drowning, Slade’s hand is choking him, and Zayn flails, clawing at the blankets around his neck until they’re gone, until he can draw in deep, ragged breaths. He’s not drowning. Slade is gone, long gone. Slade and Shado and all the ghosts. All the people he’d tried to save. All the people he’d loved and failed.  

He glances at the window. The sun is long risen, but it’s probably barely noon; he’d finally gotten to sleep at around seven so he’s not surprised. It’s more sleep than he often gets.

Rhino whines, and flops onto his lap. Zayn takes another deep breath, and runs his hand over the dog. He’s not on the island. He’s not drowning.

With one final pet for Rhino, he drags himself up. His whole body is shaking from the nightmare, but he’s not unsteady, as he makes his way to the bathroom to splash water on his face. Wide eyes stare back at him in the mirror, wide eyes and messy hair. Was that Slade’s last sight, Zayn’s wide eyes? Or Shado’s, one last vision of the woman he’d loved?

Zayn braces himself on the counter, takes another breath. He’s in LA. He’s here. He’s—

The doorbell buzzes, and Zayn jumps, the soap dish clanging to the floor as his hand rises to block a blow.

He shakes his head, trying to clear it. It has to be one of the boys. Those are the only people who visit him. The only ones who have insisted on it, who haven’t gotten the hint from his ignored calls. So he goes to his room to tug a shirt on before he goes downstairs.

A quick glance at the intercom shows brown curls and a bright floral shirt. Zayn closes his eyes for a second, leaning against the wall inside. At least Harry hadn’t been in the dream. This time.

He takes one more breath. He shouldn’t do this. He should keep the door shut, should forget what Harry’s body had felt like against his, should forget the thing that’s always burned between them, should forget the way Harry eases him out of himself, for Harry’s good. That’s how Harry will be safe.

_Selfish bastard._ Zayn opens the door. 

Harry starts, then his eyes go a little wide, like they do every time he sees Zayn now. “He!” He raises his hand in half a wave. “Did I wake you?”

“No.” Zayn brushes his hair out of his eyes. His skin is clammy with leftover sweat. At least he’d put on a shirt, so Harry can’t see his scars. “I’d just woken up.”

“You look more awake than usual, for just having woken up,” Harry tilts his head. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah.” Zayn steps back, and lets Harry in. Last time he’d come in, he’d pushed Zayn against the counter and kissed him until he couldn’t breathe, until he’d been drowning in Harry. This time, though, Harry hangs back, his brows furrowed as he looks at Zayn.

“Are you okay?”

Zayn shakes his head. He’s here. Harry doesn’t know how broken he is. “I’m fine.”

“You can talk to me.” Harry moves slowly, when he puts his hand on Zayn’s arm, slowly enough Zayn doesn’t react. “You know that, right?”

I did, Zayn could say. I told you things. Told you about the girl I got killed. You don’t want to know more, not about my cracked edges, the parts where I’m bleeding.

“I’m fine,” Zayn repeats. “Have a good night?”

“Yeah, it was great.” Harry lets his hand fall, and heads towards the kitchen. Zayn trails after him. “You haven’t had breakfast, right? Want me to make something?”

“I’m good.”

“You need eggs, I’ll make us some omelets.” Harry waves his hand in dismissal. “We can brunch. But it was a good day. Hung out with Jeff.” He leans down to pull out a pan. “He’s going to London, you know. He’s been trying to focus more of his business there, I think he’s still trying to get out from his father’s shadow.”

“Who?”

“Jeff.” Harry turns around, puts on an exaggerated pout. “Are you even listening?”

Zayn can feel his shoulders relax. It feels so normal. Feels like every other day Harry’s been here. Feels like days on the bus, back when everything was good and simple. “No.”

“Worst friend ever.” Harry makes a face. Zayn sticks out his tongue back, and Harry grins, bright as the sun, as it had ever been back when they were eighteen and had the world at their feet.

He didn’t smile at the Arrow like that, Zayn thinks. The Arrow might get the flirtation, but he didn’t get that grin. Zayn shouldn’t get that grin either, though. If Harry knew, he wouldn’t get it. If Harry knew what Zayn had done—who he was…if he didn’t think he was the same person he’d been five years ago…he’d leave. He should leave. The things Zayn loves end in pain and blood, and Harry should know that. Should leave before it’s Harry’s blood. Zayn should just open his mouth, say what he’d been able to say with a hood over his face and the darkness around him. Stay away. I’m not safe. Go home. Go away.

“Zayn?” Harry’s voice is low and slow, like a dream; Zayn looks up and Harry’s closer, his brow furrowed, the smile gone. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He’s fine. He just needs to say the words, and he can’t.

Like before, Harry moves slowly, as his hands rise to cup Zayn’s face. It’s slow enough Zayn steels himself, lets Harry’s hand brush over his cheeks.

“You know you can talk to me?” Harry says softly. The afternoon light is falling over him, coloring him in gold. He looks like every daydream Zayn hadn’t let himself have. He looks like an idol, the thing Zayn needs to protect. The last thing Harry needs is for Zayn to talk to him. To sully that golden innocence, because he is innocent. He doesn’t know. He’s touching Zayn like there’s no blood to wipe onto him. Just say it. Just tell him to stay away. _You’re a selfish bastard, Zayn Malik. It’s all your fault._

“I’m fine,” Zayn repeats. Harry doesn’t move, keeps Zayn looking at him with his face in his hands. “Really, Harry.”

Harry doesn’t blink, just stares, that long unwavering stare that had used to make Zayn have to look away. Zayn doesn’t look away now. Maybe he’ll see it in Zayn, see what he was. What he’s done. Maybe he’ll see it and Zayn won’t have to say the words.

“Can I kiss you?”

Zayn would jump, if he could. “What?”

“Can I kiss you?” Harry repeats. His thumb strokes over Zayn’s cheek. _He touches my face all the time. I don’t mind_. Harry’s face is so close, his lips just slightly parted, his eyes wide. Tell him. Just tell him. Tell him to leave. Tell him no. Tell him Zayn will hurt him, because that’s what he does.

Harry closes the distance between them, and Zayn has time to move away, he knows Harry’s speed is a question, an opening, but—but he can’t pull away. He can’t not move, can’t not sink into Harry when he kisses him, his lips and hands gentle on Zayn’s skin, barely a whisper. It’s been…he doesn’t know how long it’s been, since someone touched him like this; with Shado it was rough and fast, necessary but brief, quiet in the times when Slade was gone. Nothing like this, long and slow, in the sunlit kitchen as Harry leans into him.

“Zayn,” Harry breathes, as he pulls away, just an inch. “Was that okay?”

Zayn can only nod. He keeps his eyes closed. He’s here. He’s here in his LA kitchen, and this isn’t a dream, and it’s not going to turn into a nightmare.

“Let’s go upstairs,” Harry’s hands slide down to Zayn’s shoulders, to his waist, easing him up off the stool. Tell him. Zayn needs to tell him. Needs to warn him to leave, that he should get far away from Zayn and all his shit. That he should find another nice safe girl, not Zayn, not the dream of who Zayn was.

Then Harry kisses him again, and somehow Zayn’s hands are in his hair, over his shoulders, down his back. So solid, not a dream at all; last time might have felt like it but this is real, this is Harry here kissing him. This isn’t the nightmare, isn’t Slade’s dead eyes or Shado’s bleeding throat or so much blood. He kisses Harry like he can devour that, devour him here, whole; take everything he needs because he is selfish, he is. He’s a selfish bastard and he’s not going to tell Harry no, not going to tell him what he should do, because he wants Harry. Wants him to touch him like this, to tell him with his hands and lips that it’s not Zayn’s fault, that he’s here and he made it back and he’s not what the island made him, not completely.

“Upstairs,” Harry urges, before kissing him again, trailing his lips over Zayn’s neck, scraping against the stubble. Zayn nods and tugs him back, towards the stairs. Upstairs. He can do upstairs.

They stumble upstairs still connected, and they never did this when they were twenty but there’s something about it that feels like that, that mixed up and hurried. He needs Harry now, suddenly, needs him right now, needs to feel him until everything settles beneath his skin, in a way he hasn’t had for years, because Shado—

But he can’t think about her now. Not when Harry’s on his back on Zayn’s sheets, mussing them for the first time since he’s been back, laughing a little as Zayn climbs on top of him, and he wants—he wants everything. He leans down to kiss that laughter away from Harry, to swallow it down and see if it can be his. He is selfish, he knows he is, because this will hurt Harry in the end, but he can’t seem to stop. Can’t seem to stop kissing Harry, tasting his skin. He trails his mouth down Harry’s neck, over the collarbone left revealed by his shirt. Harry’s fingers are in his hair, his shoulders, trailing over his back, just as fast and desperate, trailing down to the hem of his shirt.

That brings Zayn back to himself. Underneath his shirt—underneath his shirt is the ugliness of what he is, of what he’s been for five years. Harry thinks he’s still the Zayn of five years ago, the one who wasn’t broken, who hadn’t been remade, whose skin is still smooth and beautiful. And he’s selfish, and he wants to keep that as long as he can. Keep Harry thinking that.

So he doesn’t let Harry take his shirt off, distracts him by undoing the buttons on Harry’s shirt, trailing his lips down. He’s never known Harry like this before, but it feels like he has. Feels like he knows Harry’s skin, from dreams he’d tried not to have.

“Zayn, fuck,” Harry swears, as Zayn fumbles at his jeans. He’s graceless, he knows; he’s not the man he was five years ago, who was smooth and practiced at this. Who remembered how to do this as something more than desperate fumblings. But Harry doesn’t seem to mind, by the noises he’s making, the way he’s squirming under Zayn’s hand—how hard he is, when Zayn finally gets his jeans open.

“Come on, come on,” Harry urges, his voice low and hoarse, and Zayn’s heard that tone before, to girls in shared rooms, but it’s different now—deeper, more sure. Less arrogant, more assured that it’s going to happen, that it will be good.

And it is good, the way Harry moans when Zayn starts jerking him off, probably clumsy and too fast but he can’t help it, can’t help his desperation as he mouths at Harry’s chest, sucking at his nipple until Harry makes a noise suspiciously like a whine.

“Stop, Zayn, wait—”

Zayn freezes, but Harry just goes for his sweats, yanks them down so he can get his hand on Zayn’s cock. It’s still like fire, the shock of that touch, of someone else touching him, of Harry touching him, enough that Zayn bites back a groan and his hips buck into Harry’s hand.

“’s okay,” Harry hums, his other hand in Zayn’s hair, gentle. So gentle, despite the heat and how hard he is under Zayn’s hand. “What’s your hurry?”

Zayn buries his face in Harry’s neck so he might not be able to hear him. “Not gonna last long,” he admits, and he can feel Harry’s smile.

“I’ll take that as a compliment, I think.” Then he’s got his hand around both of them, and there’s the friction of Harry’s dick against his own, and Harry must have spit into his hand at some point because his hand’s wet enough to glide easily over them.

Zayn doesn’t last long, doesn’t know how he could, after so long and with Harry moving against him, kissing him until he breathes out Harry’s name into his mouth and comes. Harry swears as he does, lets go of Zayn to jerk himself off faster, and he kisses Zayn hard until he comes too.

Once Zayn manages to get up to clean them off, Harry curls onto his side, pulling at Zayn’s arm so it wraps around his waist. Zayn lets him pull, lets him drape Zayn over his back. Harry’s bare skin is warm, his heartbeat soothing. Harry apparently still sleeps whenever he can, because he’s out in a second. In another life, Zayn would fall asleep here too, his head in Harry’s hair. Once, he could have.

But the bed is so soft, the sheets so smooth they feel harsh against his skin. And he’s not that selfish; isn’t going to risk Harry asleep next to him, no more than he’d risk his sisters. Harry deserves the sound sleep. So he waits until Harry’s breathing evens out, then he slides out of bed. He pulls one of the blankets off the floor to throw over Harry, because he’s not really an asshole, not yet. Harry snuffles in his sleep, but he doesn’t wake.

Zayn spares him a look, for this beautiful man in his bed, his hair spread out over the pillows and the sun sinking into his flushed cheeks. Then he shuts the door behind him, and goes downstairs.

\---

Harry wakes up alone. The sun is still streaming in through the windows, so his nap must not have been long, but he’s definitely alone. It’s not—he’s not offended, not really, but he misses the warmth of Zayn that he had when he fell asleep. It feels like a lack, when he wakes up with only the blankets cold beside him, rolls over and there’s no Zayn next to him. Even when they were kids and sharing a bed, that had never happened. Harry’d always woken up first, even if then he’d sometimes closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep longer, to stay cuddled up with Zayn.

But this time he’s properly alone, not even Rhino at his feet. He rolls onto his back, and sighs. Zayn’s probably just been sleeping a lot. Who cares if he didn’t want to nap in the middle of the day?

Harry throws off the blanket, and gets to his feet. He hadn’t had a chance to look at Zayn’s room before, but it’s sort of what he expected—bold colors and strong lines, bits of art on the wall, though Harry’s not sure if those went up before or after he came back. It’s a weird state of half-messiness Harry’s never quite seen in Zayn’s rooms before—he’d always managed to make a hotel room they’d been in for three hours a mess. But now, though there are blankets and pillows on the floor, none of the other stuff Zayn tended to acquire is anywhere, not even pictures of his family. It makes the room feel bare. Unlived in, which is never a problem any of Zayn’s residences have ever had.

But Zayn must be somewhere. So Harry pulls his clothes back on, pulls his hair back into a ponytail, and goes downstairs.

He hasn’t had a chance to explore the house yet really, for all the time he’s spent here. Zayn’s always with him, in a way that made exploration feel like prying, but Zayn left him alone in his bed, so it’s like an invitation on a platter. An invitation into the mind of Zayn, because his home has always been a reflection of his mind.

If that’s true, then Zayn’s mind is…Harry doesn’t know what it is, and that’s weird. Zayn had never been able to hide his emotions. Even when things were bad, in hindsight, the signs were there—they’d talked about it, all four of them, sitting in shock after hearing the news about the plane crash, in a way they hadn’t been able to before. About the things they should have seen, and the things they’d known but never really acknowledged. Harry remembers Zayn’s London house then, the anger in it. But now, here…there’s just nothing. Zayn’s been here two months almost, and most of the rooms Harry peeks into feel untouched. He sees guest bedrooms with the beds neatly made, a library that, though there are books on the table, still doesn’t feel occupied. The pile of comics on a shelf has clearly not been touched for years. The game room, a few doors down, is just as strictly clean. He hasn’t even played any video games when Harry’s been there, he realizes. And not with Louis either apparently.

It’s almost like walking through a haunted house. There’s a collage on the wall in the den, one Harry’s seen before but never taken the time to look at. It’s intense, all the shit Zayn’s always liked—but the paper is starting to yellow, the edges drooping. Nothing’s been added. Just like nothing’s been done on the graffiti wall. Like it’s clear nothing’s been touched in the studio, the guitars dusty and equipment off. Harry’d never thought he’d see a time when Zayn wasn’t making art, wasn’t creating—that had always been what Zayn _did_ , even when he was feeling messed up. Especially when he was feeling messed up. It makes Harry shiver. Makes something twist in him, that Zayn was hurt that badly.

Zayn, it turns out, is in the pool, swimming laps. It still takes Harry aback a little, seeing him in the pool, but it’s hot too, watching him cut through the water, how his muscles shift and glisten. He’d used to cling whenever they’d managed to get him in the water, staying resolutely in the shallow end or holding onto one of them for dear life—usually Liam, but sometimes it had been Harry, and Harry’d laughed and let him. It’d been one of their things, the things they’d never talked about, how their wet skin had slid together, how Zayn’d pressed a little too close, how Harry’d held on a little too hard.

Zayn clearly doesn’t need to hold onto Harry anymore. But Harry thinks of the haunted house inside, how empty it felt. Thinks of Zayn all alone all day, with just his dog for company, not even his books or music or art. That’s not right. Zayn isn’t empty. Zayn’d always been filled with so much, even when it hurt.

He must sense Harry watching, because instead of doing a flip turn Zayn grabs onto the wall, looks up at Harry. He doesn’t say anything, but his gaze is clear.

“No napping for you?” Harry asks, smiling. They have to talk. He knows that. But he also wants to sit with Zayn in the sun, get him to laugh again. See if he could find that Zayn again, the one who’d been like a firebrand of his own, a constant rush Harry’d only ever found on stage.

Zayn shrugs. His gaze is wary. “Wasn’t tired. Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Harry leans down to roll up his jeans, then sits down at the edge of the pool, his feet dangling next to Zayn. The water’s bitingly refreshing. “We should probably talk about it, though.” Zayn’s face doesn’t change. Harry takes that as an opportunity to keep going. “We don’t have to, you know, _talk_ talk. Just, we should acknowledge this is happening, right?” He doesn’t know. Zayn’s the one who’s been in a relationship before. Harry’s never felt the need to talk again. “Figure out what it is?”

Slowly, Zayn nods. Harry still can’t quite read his expression. “I..” he starts, then shakes his head in frustration. Water flings from the ends of his hair, spattering Harry’s thighs. “I’m not…” Yet again, he trails off, like he doesn’t know the words. It’s not what Harry expected from Zayn, who always fell into relationships and love. But he’s only been back a few months. “I can’t be…”

“That’s fine!” Despite himself, Harry lets out a breath. If Zayn had said he wanted all in—wanted this to be Them, to be boyfriends, he’d have said yes probably, but the idea of it makes him shiver. “I’m fine not really defining it. You know me. I’m good at that.”

Zayn’s lips press together, but he nods. “Thanks. I don’t mean…”

Harry grins crookedly. “It’s okay, Zayn. I’m not a relationship guy. That hasn’t changed.”

“What about Leah?” Zayn’s voice is flat.

“That wasn’t a thing, not really. Don’t worry. I’m okay not scaring my commitment phobic ass off.”

“That sounds like Liam talking.”

“It’s a lot of people talking.” Harry shrugs. He knows who he is. He doesn’t lose sleep over it. “I get bored. It sounds horrible, but I’m usually not interested in people for that long. It’s never…I don’t know, it’s never what Liam and Diana have. It’s not even what you and Perrie had.”

“Don’t judge relationships by me and Perrie.”

“You loved her.” Harry’d known that. Too well.

“I was a shitty boyfriend.” Zayn pushes himself up, out of the pool. It’s a smooth motion, without strain. Harry licks his lips. Fucking hell, Zayn got strong. “You know that.” Once on his feet, he heads to a lounge chair where his towel lies, starts to dry himself off. Harry watches with interest as the terrycloth covers his back. There’s more ink there, ink Harry hasn’t gotten a chance to see. Ink and marks. Scars. “I hurt her. We hurt each other, I don’t know.”

“Do you regret it, then?” It’s something Harry’s always wondered, the thing he’d never dared ask Zayn, because he wasn’t sure he’d like the answer he’d get. If Zayn regretted how he loved, the intensity of his emotions.

Something faraway comes into Zayn’s voice, almost like he’s quoting. “Regrets just slow you down. Do better next time.”

“I haven’t changed, though.” Zayn’s pulling on a shirt, a white t-shirt that clings to his wet skin. Harry would really like to take it off of him. “Like, with Leah…I didn’t love her. I wasn’t close. I think she might have loved me. In the beginning at least.” He pauses, then adds. “I’m not sure if that makes me a bad person. That I know that, and I didn’t do anything about it.”

“You’re not a bad person.” Zayn turns around as he says it, and his eyes are alight, in a way Harry’s not sure he’s seen yet, outside of sex. Burning with that sure and certain fire that Harry’d always admired, always sought. “Trust me, Harry. You’re not a bad person. You’re one of the best people I know.”

Harry grins, helplessly soppy. There’s always going to be a part of him that’s sixteen and utterly wild to impress Zayn. That gets butterflies in his stomach when Zayn says shit like that.

And he wants to give that back. Wants to give Zayn that fire back, at least, the part of him that does things passionately enough to regret. Wants to help him fill up his emptiness.

“Come to the show with me on Wednesday.”

“What?” Zayn’s head tilts in confusion. “The show?”

“We’re doing one of the daytimes shows, to promo the new single. Interview and a performance, you know. You should come.” Should get out of the house, Harry doesn’t say. Should at least hear music again.

“Why?”

“Because it’s the only concert I can be sure you’ll get into soon.” Harry gets up, because Zayn might be stubborn but Harry also knows how to get him to do what he wants. Or he did. It should still work. He pouts a little, lets his lower lip jut out and his eyes widen. “For old time’s sake?”

“I…” He can see Zayn waver, see some conflict playing out in his gaze. So Harry wraps his arms around Zayn’s waist, pulls him close. The wetness from Zayn’s clothes is sinking into Harry, and he can’t find it in him to care. He’s not wearing anything he likes that much. “I shouldn’t, Harry.”

“Please?” Harry repeats, batting his eyelashes. “It’s not like you’d be singing. Just hanging out with us all.” He can see Zayn weakening. He’d never really been able to stand up to Harry when he wanted something, not when they were cuddled close and Harry could feel Zayn’s breathing against him. “I know it would mean a lot to the fans, to know you’re alive. And the boys.” There it is. He knew that one would work. It’s still Zayn.

“Fine.” Zayn nods, and doesn’t detach himself from Harry. “Yeah, that’ll be. Okay.”

“It’s a date. No take backsies,” Harry warns, and Zayn rolls his eyes.

“I won’t.”

“Good.” It occurs to Harry, then, that they’re twined together, and now, he doesn’t have to back away, trying not to blush, willing away the need to not let go, and trying not to meet Zayn’s eyes to see if he felt the same. Now, he slides his hands down to Zayn’s ass, doesn’t move.

“I’m getting your clothes wet,” Zayn points out. Harry grins. This is all he needs. Zayn, here with him, in his arms.

“I guess you’ll just have to get me out of them, won’t you?”

\---

“Do you know how much press you’re getting?” Louis follows Zayn down into the basement. Zayn had somehow not been surprised when he showed up that night, long after Harry had gone home to go out to dinner with someone Zayn didn’t know. He’d left with another kiss, his fingers trailing over Zayn’s stomach, a few centimeters from the line of dirty stitches that slashed across Zayn’s stomach. He’d nearly died of that one. And now Harry’s fingers were there, trailing heat.

Zayn shakes his head, as he shakes out his leathers. “What press?”

“People are talking, bro.” Louis throws himself into his chair, pulls out his phone. He looks like they’re back in the mystery machine, casual as anything. “I’ve been looking around, I wanted to see what the reaction was.”

“I don’t care what the reaction is.” Zayn pulls the armor on, starts to buckle it. It’s comfortable. He knows this armor. It keeps him safe. Away from Harry’s gentle touch, away from the things he should have said. He can protect himself, in this. “This isn’t a publicity stunt.”

“You should always care what people are saying. If they turn on you, next thing you know the police will actually crack down on you instead of taking the guys you leave them.” Louis hums, flicking through his phone. It’s a problem Zayn’s thought of, but luckily not one that he’s come across yet. If he does…he’ll cross that bridge when he comes to it.

“I don’t need to be liked. I need to—”

“Save this city, I know. Most people do like you, though. Badass. Great ass, was also used.” Louis snorts. “First time you’ve ever heard that.”

Zayn kneels down to pull on his boots. The clothing is tighter than the sweatpants and t-shirt he wore all day, but it feels looser. Easier to move in.

“My ass doesn’t matter.”

“Tell that to the fangirls.” Louis retorts. “Most of the politicians hate you. Bad for order, and all that.”

“Because I’m the one who’s creating disorder.” Zayn shakes out his limbs, then picks up his bow. The weight of it is easy in his hands. Everything is simpler, with the bow in his hand, his hood on.

“There’s some great quotes. Elizabeth Warren called you a dangerous, unstable force of chaos, taking order into his own hands. Which is true.”

“I’m not taking order into my own hands.” Zayn turns to glare at Louis. He’s not. “I’m saving people. What the police do with the criminals isn’t up to me.”

“I’m helping you, aren’t I?” Louis points out, holding up his hands. “Who knows what would have happened to Freddie if you weren’t there. But it’s pretty sick, actually. You even got a mention from Maude Waters, you know, Trump’s advisor? She called you “A menace with an unknown nefarious agenda, preying on innocent Americans and endangering us all.” Louis laughs. “Coming from the woman forcing Americans into camps.”

“I don’t care what she thinks, either. Has your contact found anything about the warehouse?”

“Not yet. She’s working on it. There are shell corporations, apparently.” Of course there are. Secrets within secrets, dangers within dangers, and always Charles’s list, the danger Zayn doesn’t even know. The threat hanging over them all. “You should care about those camps, though. If it passes…”

“I’m not an American citizen. I’ll be fine.”

“You really think Trump and his cronies would care about your citizenship? You’ve never been quiet about your religion, Zayn. And with who you are…they can’t let you not be in the camps, if they exist.”

“I’d like to see them try.” Zayn fingers are on his bow, tight. His knuckles are probably white under his gloves. “I’m not going anywhere.” He can’t. He won’t. He can still taste Ivo’s cells on his skin, the ropes against his wrists. The moment he looked around and realized he was stuck on the island. He’s never going back to somewhere like that.

Louis raises his eyebrows at him. “What?” Zayn demands.

“Sometimes I forget.”

“What?”

“That you’re really fucked up, aren’t you?”

Slowly, Zayn forces himself to let go of the bow. Somehow, phrased like that, it’s simple. He’s not broken. He’s not wrong. He’s just fucked up.

“Five years in purgatory.” Zayn slides the bow onto his back. He needs to patrol. He needs to hit something. Needs to do what he knows he can. “I’m going out.”

“Take these.” Louis pulls out what looks like ear plugs, holds them out. Zayn eyes them. He knows the look of those.

“Comms?”

“I’ve got a connecting set,” Louis confirms, “My friend, she got them for me. She doesn’t know why,” he goes on immediately. “But I thought it would be good for you to have more than a cell phone to connect you to HQ.”

Zayn picks up the comm unit. It looks pretty standard. “And what will you do from here?” he asks. Louis can’t hack. He can’t fight. What could he do?

Louis glares at him, that fierce gaze he’d turned on anyone who’d ever challenged him. “Make sure you’re alive.”

For another second, Zayn hesitates. Then he picks up the comm, and puts it in his ear.

\---

Harry’s almost humming, as he wanders down the street toward his car. He probably would whistle, if it wouldn’t draw the attention of everyone around him, and he doesn’t want to be spotted. Not that there’s many people around him now, this late, but if there’s one thing he’s learned since X Factor it’s to never doubt where fans might pop out of. So he doesn’t whistle, but he’s still bouncing a bit in his boots. His life’s pretty good. The shoot for the new perfume he’s repping was good, he’s got the start of a new song down, then he just had dinner with Jeff and Glenne before Jeff was off to London again. And Zayn. Harry spares a grin to himself. Zayn, and the taste of him, the feel, everything he’d dreamed of for so long.

He might be a little caught up in the memory, in how Zayn’s hands had felt against him, in his lips, that he doesn’t notice the puddle. His boots, which admittedly do not have the best treads, slide out from under him, and he windmills, his arms circling as he spares a moment to thank god no one is around him or knows who he is, because Harry Styles falling on his ass in a puddle would be a great picture for the tabloids.

It’s not unusual, though, and he manages to catch himself through some creative gymnastics, if he does say so himself, finally straightening and readjusting his hat. He’s cool. No one saw. No one was around. No one—but he can feel eyes on him, and he turns, and there he is again, lean and shadowed, with his bow over his back and his hooded head straight.

Of course the Arrow would see him fumble like that. Harry runs a hand through his hair, and wills away his embarrassed flush.

“Are you okay?” The Arrow asks. Harry glances around, but no one else is there. Of course.

“Fine.” Harry grins, trying for distraction. “Unless you want to beat up a puddle for my honor.” The Arrow looks at him, or Harry thinks he does. It’s hard to tell under the hood, but the body language isn’t impossible to read. Harry’s used to people not being amused by his jokes, though. “Why are you here, though?” he asks instead. “Are you following me?”

The Arrow slowly lets his hands fall back down to his side, the bow settling against his back. It makes the muscles of his arms move, and Harry can’t help stealing a glance at them. He’s just all muscle, probably. He’d have to be, to be a vigilante, but he’s just the right sort of muscle probably, lean but strong, not bulky. Just like Harry likes.

“You don’t seem worried by that.”

Harry shrugs. “I’ve been stalked before.”

“By a man with a bow?”

Harry shrugs again. He doesn’t say the thrill that goes through him, that the Arrow hasn’t denied following him. That the Arrow showed himself to stop Harry from falling in a puddle. That this dangerous man has saved him. It’s probably not healthy. But Harry’s lived his life chasing the adrenaline high of the stage, and this isn’t less of one. “So it’s true then?” he goes on. He edges over to the side of the building, so he can lean nonchalantly on it, crossing one leg over the other in the way he knows looks best. “You are following me? Are you a fan, then? I am your favorite, aren’t I?”

The Arrow tilts his head. It reveals a slice of a sharp jaw, covered with stubble. “You get into the most trouble, it seems.”

“I do,” Harry admits, cheerfully. If getting into trouble means the Arrow has to come and save him, he’s not entirely complaining. “Once I almost wandered into a pillar of fire, on stage. My bandmate had to pull me out.” It had been scary at the time, he supposes, the sudden feel of fire, Zayn’s hands on his hips yanking him away. But in the past seven years that’s faded, and really the memory is of Zayn’s white face, of how he’d held onto Harry, of how after that show he’d tucked himself in close to Harry like he was afraid of what would happen if he let go. The others had been concerned, and Louis had mocked him plenty—so had Zayn, if it came to that—but Zayn was the one who’d saved him. Who’d held on so tight. It had been part and parcel of everything then, Zayn holding on, Harry holding back, and the silence between them.

And now there isn’t silence, and Harry knows what it feels like to have Zayn’s hand on him for real—and the Arrow is right here, following him, and Harry is thrilling in it.

Harry pushes that aside for another day. “Though Niall falls too! There was a whole meme about it.”

“He hasn’t been attacked.” The Arrow doesn’t seem convinced.

“He was there once.”

“You were there twice.” The Arrow says it slowly, like it’s only occurring to him now. His hand twitches for his bow.

“And so were you.” And this isn’t what Harry wants to talk about particularly, how close the men with guns came. Even if he can still see the flash of the Arrow’s fists, how he’d moved like a cat, the sudden explosion of ferocity. “So what have you been doing tonight? Just following me? Saving damsels?”

The Arrow tosses his head. It doesn’t dislodge his hood, but the frustration is clear. “Not enough.”

“So what was it? A mugging?” Harry’s always been told he asks too many questions, but he likes to know about lives, and this is a life more interesting than any he’s ever met. “More trucks being robbed?”

The Arrow is quiet for a second, long enough that Harry wonders if he pushed his luck too much, should backtrack. He’s about to open his mouth to do that when the Arrow speaks. “There was a girl.”

“A girl?” Harry’d thought he was special, but he supposes it makes sense he isn’t. That the Arrow isn’t into guys. That he has other people he talks to, other favorites. He’s not Mary Jane, or whoever it is in Zayn’s comics. He’s okay—or at least, it makes sense.

“A girl being attacked,” The Arrow goes on. Harry tamps down on the utterly inappropriate happiness that the girl was being attacked, and isn’t the Arrow’s girlfriend. “I almost didn’t get there in time.”

“Almost?” Harry specifies. “So you did.”

“Barely.” The Arrow shakes his head again. He’s so still, most of him, other than those motions. Like he’s holding all of himself in.

“But she’s safe now.” Harry knows how she feels, probably—or not really, not being attacked, but the feeling of the Arrow swooping out of the sky to save her. Appearing out of nowhere like Robin Hood and an avenging angel all in one, deadly and merciless and beautiful.

“As much as I can make her.”

“So what’s the problem? You saved someone! That’s the point, right?” Harry remembers this, from the comics Zayn and Liam had forced him to read. “Keeping the streets safe? That sounds like a good night.” The Arrow twitches, and Harry thinks he knows what that means. “Was that even all?”

“There was a weapons deal too,” the Arrow admits. Harry snorts.

“A very good night,” Harry repeats. He wonders what he’ll see in the papers tomorrow—about one man and his bow, against however many gangbangers. And yet the Arrow is standing here unscathed, like he is Superman. Harry might need to pull out some of those comics.

“It’s not enough,” the Arrow repeats.

“No? Is there a damsel quota?” Harry teases. “Do I count as one? You didn’t save me properly from the puddle.”

“It’s never enough,” the Arrow replies simply. His hands are fists, probably bruised and battered. Fighting for the city, for the people here. Then he shakes his head. “Get to your car, Harry. It’s not safe out here.”

“You’re here,” Harry points out. He doesn’t want the Arrow to leave. This is the best way to end this day, with the Arrow here, in all his fascinating mystery. Giving Harry bits and pieces, more than anyone else gets. He might not be Mary Jane, but the Arrow is—he’s more than anything Harry’s ever met before. Being here almost feels like being on stage, that same rush. The rush Harry’s been chasing every day since he was sixteen, the one nothing’s ever matched, except maybe the moment he heard Zayn was alive, and that was totally different.

The Arrow reaches back, pulls off his bow. It’s sleek and dark and deadly, just like him. “I’m not safe.”

Harry tilts his head at its most becoming angle. “Then why are you following me?”

The Arrow does that same thing, where he just looks at Harry, and Harry shouldn’t know that’s what he’s doing but he’s sure it is. Sure that he’s looking at him like he can see into his soul, like he knows him inside and out. Like he’s arrowing into Harry’s heart.

“Get to your car,” the Arrow repeats, and then he’s gone.

Harry doesn’t move, for a long moment. That hadn’t been an answer, in the best way. Harry’s out here flirting with a superhero. Louis’s probably so jealous of him. Zayn would be so jealous of him.

Zayn. Harry smiles to himself, at the thought of him, and stands up straight to head towards his car. It’s too late to see him tonight, but tomorrow…


	7. Chapter 6

“You’re looking pretty pleased with yourself.”

Harry grins at Niall. He’s feeling pretty pleased with himself, honestly. He’d gone over to Zayn’s this morning, and Zayn had pushed him down onto the couch and blown him like he was desperate for it, looking up at Harry through his eyelashes like he was begging for something he couldn’t say. Whatever it was, Harry hopes he got it. He’d certainly seemed calmer, as they piled into the car to head to the taping.

Even now, Harry can see him, leaning against a wall, watching. Harry’d managed to get him backstage, but when Harry had gone to makeup Zayn had shied away, sinking back into the shadows. Once, he’d have been here with them, joking with Caroline, commenting on everyone’s outfit like he was some sort of expert. Now, Harry can just feel his gaze on the back of his neck, and that’s not new but it feels like it is.

He looks more like his old self, now. In his jeans and Henley, his hair styled, he looks like he’s ready to go on with them, not like the Zayn in sweatpants and messy hair he’s been for weeks. It’s good to see him like this. To see he can still put himself together, if he wants, and the messiness is by choice.

Like he can tell Harry’s looking at him, Zayn focuses on Harry, raises an eyebrow in a question. Harry grins back.

“Yeah,” he answers Niall, “I’m feeling pretty good.”

“Glowing, even,” Liam adds, dropping into the seat next to him. “Leah treat you well this morning?”

“Leah?” Right. It occurs to him he hadn’t said anything about their break up to the boys, either. It hadn’t felt like anything. Not with everything new. “Nah, wasn’t her.”

Liam’s face does the complicated, judgmental thing it had used to do when he’d seen Zayn with girls on tour. “Harry…”

“We broke up,” Harry’s quick to add. There had been no cheating. Really. “Like, a week ago.”

“A week ago?” Niall snorts. “Way to keep us updated.”

“Are you okay?” Liam leans in close, looking into Harry’s face like he’s trying to see him breaking down. “You should have told us.”

“I’m fine.” Harry smirks. “Better than fine, really.”

“Means he’s still getting laid.” Louis announces himself by hip-checking Liam and settling on the arm of his chair. Elsewhere, Harry can see the stylists giving them the half annoyed, half amused look they’ve always gotten. The prickle on his neck, like Zayn’s watching, hasn’t gone away. He’d say he should join them, but Harry’s not sure he should, honestly. He fits here. But Harry doesn’t know how. It’s been six years, and they’ve made their own patterns without him. “I’m not surprised.”

“When has Harry not been getting laid?” Niall points out.

“Before I was sixteen?” Harry suggests.

Liam’s still shaking his head. “You broke up, really? But you’d been doing so well. Three months.”

Harry shrugs. “It was never serious.” Liam had wanted it to be, maybe. Leah might have, once. But he’d never thought it was.

“It never is.” Liam’s face is doing the judgmental thing. Harry’s having a good day, he doesn’t want to get into this. Liam’s been giving him the same lecture since he turned twenty-two, or so. He’s ready to let it go, but,

“What does that mean?” Louis demands.

Liam looks at Louis this time. “Just that it was the longest relationship Harry’s ever been in.”

“So what? He should have stayed in it just because it was long?”

“No.” Liam’s squaring up now, and Harry sighs, settles back in his chair. They would get into one of these things now. “But he’s never had a serious relationship. Ever.”

“Not everyone wants to be married by twenty-five.” Harry thinks that’s a bit rich of Louis to say, given he’d been pretty close to the altar before twenty-five, but really he just wishes they would stop. Sometimes their banter is amusing. Sometimes it just rubs Harry wrong, why they won’t just be quiet sometimes, just stay mum so they can get along. Niall looks the same, from the look he’s giving them, his lips pressed together like they get when Liam and Louis are in confrontational modes.

“I don’t think he needs to be married. I just think he should commit to something.”

“Or maybe he should do what he wants.”

“I’m not saying he shouldn’t! I’m just saying he’s twenty-six, he—”

“Can hear you, yeah?” One of Zayn’s hands is on Harry’s neck, the other brushing Liam’s arm. Harry can’t stop his shiver, at the brush of Zayn’s hand, at the way he’d appeared. “So why are you two arguing about his life?”

“I—” Liam opens his mouth, then glances at Zayn, his gaze flitting away like it’s hard to see him.

Louis just grins impishly, almost a smirk. “Hey, Zayn. We’re just talking about how much sex Harry’s been having.”

“It’s a really interesting subject, apparently,” Harry throws in. He doesn’t look at Zayn. They haven’t talked about this—about telling people, telling the other boys—but they haven’t even said what it is, he doesn’t want other people to know. Doesn’t want to push Zayn into anything. Doesn’t want to make himself give it a label.

“I thought everyone’d get over that while I was away.” Zayn’s voice is unreadable, no hint that he’s the one Harry’s sleeping with in it. It’s what Harry had wanted, but…when did he get to be such a good liar? He’d always been so shit at it. “Guess it never dies.”

“Harry’s dick is clearly the most interesting thing about us,” Louis agrees.

“It is the most obvious where it’s been,” Niall points out, and Harry holds back his sigh. It might be interesting, but he’s done talking about this. Done with Liam’s quiet judgment that he hasn’t settled down, or whatever. Done with the boys’ teasing that he hasn’t. He glances around, but it’s the usual pre-show buzz, where they’re settled and everyone else is running around. The only thing interesting is the TV, and it’s on Fox for some reason. Harry focuses on it anyway, so he doesn’t have to listen to whatever everyone else is bickering about, and sees the byline on the bottom.

“Shush,” he cuts Niall off, abruptly. “I want to hear this. Can you please turn up the TV?” he asks a passing PA, who gives him a face that clearly says how ridiculously demanding she thinks he is, but does it.

“Where last night the vigilante commonly known as the Arrow attacked four men, over what appears to be a girl,” the newscaster is saying. She’s standing in front of a an alley, with a bar sign clear on the edge of the screen. “All four were injured, three of whom are still in the hospital. The girl, the sole survivor who remained unharmed, has refused to comment. This is only the last in a series of attacks that make it clear that this Arrow has become a lasting threat to security, and one all the candidates have taken a stand on. Donald Trump has made a statement.”

It cuts to Donald Trump in his office, clearly being filmed. His creepy aide woman is sitting next to him, the one who always stares a bit too much. “Look at what he’s doing! Terrorizing good American citizens at their hard earned leisure!” Trump is saying, his face alight. Next to him, Harry can feel Zayn go tense, and Harry puts a hand over his. “My friends in law enforcement, they’re saying he’s as big a threat as anyone, as the terrorists, he’s got us on the run on our own land just like them. No one’s safe from people like him, who picks us off in some sort of jihad against the hard working American. Americans such as James Pollack, who is now in the hospital and expected to be paralyzed for the rest of his life. And what’s he got under his hood? What’s he not showing us? What’s the skin he’s not showing? If we don’t know that, if we don’t get dangerous men like the Arrow, and crimes such as this—where upstanding American citizens are attacked for protecting their neighbors—will only keep happening.”

It cuts back to the pretty blonde reporter. “The Arrow has of course not yet been caught, but his reign of terror is spreading. If you see him, call…”

“That’s bullshit,” Harry snaps. Zayn’s hand convulses against him.

“What?” Louis narrows his eyes at him.

“He wouldn’t. He didn’t. He was—he was protecting the girl!” Harry hisses. That had to be what the Arrow was so shaken up about last night. “And Trump’s using it to push his agenda.”

“Of course he is. It’s Trump.” Niall wrinkles his nose. “At least he’s saying something about the Arrow, though. Someone has to.”

“You think he should be caught?” Louis asks.

Niall’s fidgeting with the hem of his shirt, unsure. “He’s shooting people, Louis. That’s illegal. There’s a reason vigilantes aren’t allowed.”

“He’s doing good.” Harry knows that. He has to. “He’s leaving people for the police. It’s like a Neighborhood Watch, more.”

“Where people are paralyzed?” Niall shakes his head. “Stable people don’t run around shooting people. Just because it’s not a gun doesn’t mean it’s safe for him to have that power. This isn’t the middle ages. We have laws now.”

“You do what you have to.” Zayn’s voice is rough and firm and somehow out of place, like it’s coming from far away. His face is impassive when Harry looks up at him.

“That doesn’t mean it’s right.” Niall shakes his head. “I’m just saying, we don’t know who’s under the hood, and that’s dangerous.”

Harry thinks of the way the Arrow stands, one hand on his bow. Of how he appears out of the darkness when Harry needs him, and even when he doesn’t. “He’s only dangerous towards people who need it,” Harry informs Niall. “He—”

“Ten minutes, boys.” Another PA bustles up to them. “Um, Mr. Malik…” her gaze does the quick flick over Zayn everyone does, the ‘holy shit I didn’t think he’d actually be this hot in person’ look. “It’s time for you to go into the audience. I can show you.”

“Thanks.” Zayn’s hand drops from the back of Harry’s neck. His lips curve into something that’s almost a smile. “Good luck.”

Then he’s following her away, and Harry can’t stop himself from looking, watching that stalk, the way he moves like a hunting cat.

“Harry, we need a snack,” Louis announces, suddenly. Harry looks away from Zayn to Louis in surprise. “Come on.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Yes you are.” Louis hops up, and grabs Harry’s arm to pull him with him. “You never eat calories, you need more now. Got to keep your energy up.”

“I eat calories, I just eat better ones,” Harry explains, for probably the thousandth time as he follows Louis to the craft services table, leaving Liam and Niall behind. He’s not sure what’s gotten into Louis, but it’s always easier just to go along with it.

“Yeah, whatever.” Louis keeps his hold on Harry’s arm, but it shifts, almost gentles, like his expression does. He glances around, but they’re basically alone, or at least no one is paying attention to them. Liam’s on his phone, Niall’s off somewhere else. No one else really cares what they’re talking about among themselves. “I just…” he trails off, and Harry knows that expression on his face. That’s his big brother expression. “Be careful.”

“With what?”

“Zayn.”

Harry fights to keep his face straight. “What do you mean? We’re all being careful with him.”

Louis rolls his eyes. “I’m not an idiot, Harry. Those two might not notice, but it’s pretty clear where you’re getting all this sex.”

Harry presses his lips together. He wants to grin, to gush—Louis, of anyone, knew what it was like before, the constant maybe; he’d gotten Harry’s confidences when it had started, when Harry had been falling into Zayn’s orbit, and even when he and Louis grew apart he knew Louis still saw it, maybe even heard about it from Zayn. But Louis doesn’t seem happy for him. He seems worried.

“Is that a problem?” He’d wondered—or no, he hadn’t wondered. He’d known Zayn and Louis were best friends, nothing more, no matter how jealous he’d gotten sometimes, when they’d disappear off to the Mystery Machine, when Zayn would drift into Louis so easily.

“I’m glad you’re happy.” Louis is choosing his words carefully. That’s never a good thing. “I know this has been a long fucking time coming and all. But, Haz…he’s not the kid you were in love with.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?” Louis shakes his head, and makes a series of expressions that means he’s not saying everything he wants to. It’s a new set of expressions, because it’s new that he doesn’t say everything he wants to. Growing up, Harry supposes. He did that, somewhere along the way. “I don’t just mean that he’s not a kid anymore. I mean…he’s changed. The past five years made him someone new.”

“I know.” Harry does know. He’s not stupid. He might know more than Louis, even—“she died,” Zayn had said, about the girl on the island, like it was a thing that happened. Zayn can swim. Zayn can lie now. Zayn doesn’t take his shirt off anymore. Zayn doesn’t cuddle in bed anymore. Zayn moves differently. Zayn doesn’t laugh as easily. Doesn’t care anymore, or doesn’t seem to. Doesn’t want to change the world. Collapses in alleyways, panicked.

But he still touches Harry so gently, like he’s not sure he exists. He makes jokes that only Harry laughs at. He jumps to Harry’s defense. He has flashes of the passion Harry’d always loved. He’s still Zayn. “Thanks for the warning, but I know.”

“Yeah. Just. Be careful,” Louis sighs sharply. “The trauma’s more than his scars.”

“I know. I’m trying to help. Why do you think he’s here?” Harry demands it. Louis isn’t the only one who cares about Zayn, even if it felt like he thought he was, sometimes. When Zayn had left, Louis’d raged like he was the only one betrayed. Though Harry knows that’s not fair, because when Zayn had disappeared…Louis’d been a rock, then. Pale faced and shaken, but he’d been just as fierce making sure everyone else was okay as he’d once been in his rage, when Harry could only listen to the voicemail and stare into space, too dazed to act. “I love him too, Louis.”

Louis’s eyebrows fly up. “You—”

“Love!” Harry corrects, quickly. “Not in love. Just, I love all of you.” He’s not in love with Zayn. He doesn’t think. He’s never been in love, so he wouldn’t know, but he’d had a crush that was mixed in with the very real friendship. It’s not more than that. He doesn’t think. Love is…he’s already been ripped apart by this once. Love risks so much more.

“Okay.” Louis drags the word out, sounding unconvinced. “If you say so.”

“I do.” And Harry’s always been stubborn, so he’s sure he’s right. To cement it, he grabs a piece of celery and sticks it in his mouth, so he can’t talk anyway.

\---

The interview is fine, nothing special. They point out that Zayn’s there, and Harry waves and blows a cheeky kiss as Liam says something about reconnecting. Zayn does an awkward wave when the cameras pan to him, his smile hesitant, but then the camera goes back on them and they talk about their new music instead.

Then they’re on stage, and the screams start. Harry closes his eyes for a second, drinking them in. He normally doesn’t miss the craziness of the first five years of One Direction, not really—but sometimes he does. He misses this rush, constantly. Misses the thrills, the thrill not even the Arrow’s hand on him can give him.

He catches Zayn’s eyes, partway through their second song. He can’t read Zayn’s expression, but he thinks—and he’s distracted, so he’s not sure, doesn’t have time to be sure—but he thinks there’s yearning there. For the stage, probably. For the adrenaline filling Harry as he sings, drinks in the love of the crowd, and gives it back.

\---

Harry’s still buzzing when he gets off stage. It’s not always like this, especially for shows that aren’t concerts, but he feels like a live wire, like he could explode and any instant. He smiles and nods to the host, to the crew, to the stylists and everyone, like he’s supposed to, but he needs something.

And that something, he realizes, as he sees him following a PA backstage, is Zayn. Harry’s on him in a second, grabbing for Zayn’s wrist, to drag him away—and Zayn’s hand flies up, knocking his away. Harry doesn’t have time for this, doesn’t need this. He needs Zayn. Needs him, and can have him now, like he never could before.

“Come on,” Harry orders, and this time when he reaches for Zayn’s wrist Zayn lets him take it, lets him drag him away. The bathroom’s far away, but Harry’s been in studios like this hundreds of times before, and it’s not hard to find an empty room—an unoccupied office, it looks like, but the important thing is it has a door for Harry to close and then kiss Zayn against, swallowing Zayn’s breath before he has a chance to say anything.

He’s kissed Zayn enough recently to know what he feels like, how his lips and tongue feel, how his hand on Harry’s neck feels, but it’s different now, somehow. With the high coursing through them, so close to all the cameras but in secret…he tastes so good, and Harry bites at his lip, then his jaw, trying to taste more. Zayn’s hands tighten on his neck, not painfully just enough for the zing of arousal.

“I always wondered if you were like this,” Zayn admits, and it’s almost a laugh. Harry captures that too. He’d capture all of Zayn if he could right now, would capture everything in the world, all the attention and affection he can stomach. He’s hard already, but he doesn’t know what he wants, when what he wants is everything. His hands slide up under Zayn’s shirt, and in the darkness Zayn doesn’t try to divert him or distract him, so Harry spreads his palms over Zayn’s abs, over the tattoos he knows are there. There are ridges that can’t be muscle too, though the muscle is hard and firm, more than Harry’d ever used to see. Ridges that have to be scars, but the skin is warm beneath them, warm and Zayn’s.

He doesn’t try to pull Zayn’s shirt off, like he might sometime else. He needs Zayn now. He doesn’t have time for nakedness, just for grinding into Zayn, his lips on every bit of skin he can find.

“Like what?” he manages to get out, against Zayn’s skin.

“After a show,” Zayn tells him, and then Harry’s back is against the wall and Harry hadn’t even known Zayn had moved. It’s almost unbearably hot, just like the look in Zayn’s eyes are. Even in the darkened office he’s beautiful, all his sharp lines and the burning of his eyes, his face expressive at last in his want. “You always looked a second away from coming on stage.”

“Sometimes,” Harry admits, shameless, because it’s not entirely false. Then Zayn’s on his knees, and he never used to be graceful but somehow he is now, and Harry thinks he loses all his breath as Zayn pulls open his pants. “Fuck, Zayn….”

“Yeah?” Zayn asks, and like Harry could ever say no to him even if he wanted to, when he’s on his knees in front of Harry looking up at him through his eyelashes, his lips a breath away from Harry’s dick.

“Yeah,” Harry breathes, and he can’t look away as Zayn takes him in his mouth. He looks like a shadow somehow, the dark of his hair swallowing what faint light there is, and his mouth is warm and wet and Harry’s still vibrating with all his energy, with the need, but it feels like with every time Zayn’s mouth tightens around him he’s going up, higher and higher, higher even then on stage.

“I used to dream about this,” Harry pants, because he doesn’t want to come yet but the sound of Zayn’s mouth against his cock will make him, let alone the feel. “About us, after a concert. You.”

Zayn hums, and Harry groans and presses his hands into the door. He doesn’t dare hold onto Zayn, doesn’t know how he’ll react, but he needs to do something before he explodes.

“We came so close sometimes, and I’d just—what if I hadn’t let go of you when we came offstage? What if I’d kissed you?” Harry keeps talking, and he’s never been a talker in bed, not like this, but it’s like it’s spilling out of him, in this dark room with him buzzing with the show and Zayn. If he could stay here for the rest of his life he would, never come back down. “Kissed you and dragged you to a closet. Or an office. Fuck, Zayn, how’re you—please—I’m going to come—” He doesn’t know what he’s begging for, because Zayn’s not even saying anything, just sucking him off with the sort of concentrated effort that makes it irresistible.

Zayn just looks at him, those liquid eyes reflecting everything, then he ducks his head back down and hollows out his cheeks and Harry’s coming, everything crashing over him in waves, over and over and over again until all there is is Zayn.

He sinks down to the floor when Zayn lets him go, his back against the wall. Now that the high is gone, he can breathe again, can think. Can miss it, maybe, but then Zayn’s against the wall with him.

“It’s okay,” Zayn says, when Harry reaches over to reciprocate. “I wasn’t on stage.”

Harry sighs. It might be impolite, but he’s grateful. He’d much rather sit here, slumped against Zayn, and come down from everything. Zayn’s still, almost preternaturally so, but he’s always been a good pillow. And he can’t run away from Harry here, can’t leave him to an empty bed.

“Did you really?” Zayn asks, suddenly.

“Hm?”

“Did you dream about me?”

Harry bites idly at his shoulder, through his shirt. “Who else is hot enough to keep dream me satisfied?” He doesn’t know why it’s a question. They’d both known. Known the edge they’d always teetered on, not daring to fall to one side but not ready to fall to the other either.

He feels Zayn breathe, in and out, not laughing or taking the bait, and turns his face into Zayn’s shoulder. “Yeah,” he says, quietly. He could always talk to Zayn like this, in the dark. “Before, sure, but then…I used to think, maybe, one day I’d come off stage and you’d be there. Alive. I knew you weren’t, I wasn’t pretending you were, but…” he shakes his head. It doesn’t matter. Zayn’s here now. He is alive. He’s here and he’s solid next to Harry, not a dream that would dissipate when he woke. “Sometimes it’s what got me through.”

Zayn’s hand is on his hip, drawing idle circles. Harry doesn’t think Zayn’s going to say anything to that—he doesn’t need to, really. Just saying it was enough.

But then, “I dreamed of beds.” Harry’s breath catches. He definitely didn’t think he was going to get any of the time on the island. “Like, just. A massive bed.”

“To fuck me on?” Harry suggests, trying for cheeky. Trying for something to change that memory into something good.

He doesn’t think it work, because Zayn’s voice is flat. “Sure.”

Shit. Harry hadn’t wanted—he didn’t mean to make Zayn dwell, to get him stuck back on the island. He’d wanted to bring him back, to keep him here, in LA with Harry. He sits up, so he can look Zayn in the eyes. It doesn’t work, because Zayn’s looking at his lap, but he’s halfway there at least.

“It wasn’t just because of my stage energy.”

Zayn looks up at that. Success. “What?”

“How much I wanted you, after a show.” Harry slides his hand over, so it can rest on top of Zayn’s. “You always lit up on stage too. No matter how much shit was happening off stage.”

“I never had your stage presence.”

Harry shakes his head. That’s not the point.

“You loved it. And everyone could tell. You just, you glowed.” Harry gives Zayn a lopsided smile. “And your voice, of course.” He keeps smiling, encouraging. It’s so true. Even in X Factor, when they were all nervous and filled with bravado, Zayn had been stunning when the microphone was in his hand. And he would be again. “Don’t you miss that?”

For a second, there’s silence, and there’s a chance Harry will get something.

But then Zayn shakes his head, and gets to his feet, holding out his hand for Harry. “We should go back. People are probably wondering where we are.”

Harry lets out the breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Yeah.” he lets Zayn pull him to his feet, then keeps his hold on Zayn’s hand. Zayn doesn’t pull that away.

When they get back to the greenroom, Niall’s fussing on his guitar while Louis and Liam are both peering at something on Louis’s phone.

“There’s a crowd out there,” Louis says, looking up when they come in. He smirks, even though they stopped at the bathroom on the way here and Harry knows they don’t look like Zayn was just blowing him in an empty office. Niall and Liam don’t seem to get it, at least—Harry’s pretty sure there’d be some sort of reaction if they did. “Security’s setting something up, so we can do some photos and shit.”

“Security is done setting up,” Paddy sticks his head in, smiles his welcome at Zayn. “We’re ready for you.”

“I’ll meet you—”

“Some of them are there for you.”

“What?” Zayn looks at Paddy like he doesn’t understand what he’s saying. Like he can’t comprehend it.

“Some of them are there for you,” Paddy repeats. “I heard them talking, they saw you come in. So you’re welcome to go out with the boys.”

“We’re not boys, we’re men,” Harry objects, because all of Zayn went tense.

“You’ll always be boys to me.” Paddy shakes his head. “Come on, lads. Let’s go.”

“I—” Zayn glances around, almost panicked, and his gaze sticks on Louis. He’s staring at him, like they’re doing that old telepathy thing they’d been able to do. Like he’s begging Louis to answer a question for him. “I shouldn’t.”

“We’ll be right here.” Liam sets his hand on Zayn’s back. Harry swallows down the completely unnecessary urge to knock it away. Other people can touch Zayn too. Can help him. “If you want, that is. We can just get you to one of the cars otherwise.”

Zayn’s still looking between them, so clearly caught in some conflict Harry can’t quite know. Harry reaches for his face slowly this time, slow enough that Zayn doesn’t flinch away or block the touch, so that Harry can get Zayn to focus on him.

“The fans would love it if you did,” he says, trying to will Zayn into understanding. Into getting back to where he was, into being able to talk to the fans. “You can just sign some things, take a few pictures. Nothing intense.”

“I…”

“Oh, come on.” Louis rolls his eyes and gets to his feet. “Zayn, you’ll be fine. Let’s go.” He harries them out the door, Zayn caught in between them like he’s a boat lost at sea. Paddy leads the way to the stage door, and it feels like the old days almost, when they’d always been sure to catch Niall in the middle of them so there’d be no problems with claustrophobia. Now, though, Zayn isn’t at the front, pushing ahead with Louis; now he’s the one in the middle, kept safe.

There are fans, though not too many. Harry gets a bit swept aside signing things and taking pictures, but he keeps an eye on Zayn. He’s sticking close to Liam, maybe hiding behind him at first, but then there’s a screech of “Zayn!” and Harry sees him jump, steel himself, then turn towards the girl.

He seems okay. He leans in for a picture, then she says something that makes him laugh, then there’s another woman there, older—maybe one of their original fans. Zayn leans in for another picture, then another.

“Harry!” Comes a yell, and Harry brings himself back to his own fans.

“Are you happy Zayn’s back?” someone asks, as Harry throws his arm around her for a picture.

“Of course.” Harry gives his best photo op smile.

“Is that why you’ve been hanging out with him all the time?”

Harry keeps the smile on his face. “If one of your friends came back from the dead, wouldn’t you want to hang out with him?” He glances over at Zayn—and there’s more tension there then there was. Harry bullied Zayn in coming here, he can’t let it get out of hand.

“Enjoy the album!” He tells the girls, dimpling at them all, then ducks away.

“So, thank you,” the girl Zayn’s talking to finishes, as Harry sidles up next to him. Zayn’s wide-eyed and apparently speechless, a different sort of panic on his face, so Harry sets his hand on Zayn’s hip and grins at her, stealing the attention away.

“See, Zayn. Told you your fans were loyal.”

“Always,” she agrees, staunchly. Then she makes a face, and hurries on. “Not that I don’t like One Direction too!”

“You can like us both,” Harry allows. “Now sorry, we’ve got to go. Come on Zayn.”

“Yeah.” Zayn swallows, comes back to himself. “Thanks, though. It means a lot.”

Her smile is almost blinding, and then Harry’s guiding Zayn back, towards the cars that have pulled up. The other boys are still chatting, but Harry meets Louis’s eye, and he nods and jerks his head. They all came separately anyway.

Zayn waits for Harry to climb into the car, then gets in with him, leaning against the seat.

“You okay?” Harry asks. He hopes this was a good idea. At least Zayn left the house, was looking more like himself. At least Harry got a really good blow job out of it.

“She said I changed her life,” Zayn says. He’s staring at his hands, like it’s another thing he can’t comprehend. “That listening to my music got her where she is now.” His fingers twist in his lap, over and over, like they’re trying to grab on to something.

Harry reaches out, stills them with his own fingers. “Told you,” he says, and smiles when Zayn looks up at him, looking for all the world like he was eighteen again and nervous to come into the bungalow. “Your music matters.”

\---

“There’s a break in,” Louis says, in Zayn’s ear, and Zayn grunts his acknowledgment and finishes tying the ropes on the muggers tight. The man they’d attacked is gone, run when Zayn appeared, though it’s not like it had taken long. The boys he was tying up were hardly more than that, boys. Definitely not older than Zayn.

“Where?” he asks. He heads back to where he parked his bike, at the center of this section. “Tell me where I’m going.”

He knows he’s being snappy. Doing this with Louis’s voice in his ear—he’ll get used to it, he supposes. It’s only been two days. And at least now he’s useful, when Zayn had given him the police scanner. “On…oh, shit.”

“What?” Zayn grits out. “Where?”

“You’re not going to like this.”

“Where?” Zayn demands, and Louis’s voice is frank.

“It’s a mosque, Zayn. Sounds like there’s multiple people there.”

Zayn doesn’t swear. Doesn’t do any of the things Louis sounds like he’s scared he might. He just gets on the bike. “Where, Louis?” he repeats, and he can hear his voice, and it’s cold.

He gets there seven minutes later, flying on his bike, fast enough that six years ago he’d have been afraid. He’s not afraid anymore. Doesn’t have room for fear in the face of cold, hard rage.

There are two cars outside, but no people. First mistake. No lookouts.

Zayn has to resist the urge to take off his shoes when he goes in. He should. This is not how he should be going in, even into a shadowy, darkened mosque, quiet in the nighttime. He can hear his grandmother’s voice chiding him, feel his grandfather’s name burning against his skin. He might not have a place here anymore, with Allah, but this is—not what he should be doing.

But there’s red spray paint scrawled across the wall outside. Zayn doesn’t take the time to look at it, because there’s the sound of smashing inside.

“The police are on their way,” Louis says. Zayn ignores him. They won’t get here in time. And he won’t stand for this.

It’s a small mosque, clearly doesn’t serve many people. The courtyard is only a few meters across, but it’s been lovingly decorated, the fountain mosaic covered, children’s drawings on the walls.

Or they were. There are people in the courtyard, three of them, and they have spray paint and are tugging at the pictures and laughing as they smash apart the space. One is standing at the fountain, tugging open his pants. “Think they—”

He doesn’t finish the sentence. Zayn’s arrow hits him in the base of the spine, and he freezes; crumples. Not dead, Zayn thinks clinically, as another arrow’s already flying, and the one at the wall of children’s pictures is swearing and sobbing at the arrow through his shoulder. He could kill them. He should. _Killing is sometimes necessary, but if there is time to think, there is time not to kill_. Shado would approve. He’s not killing. No matter how much he wants to.

The other man charges at him. Zayn blocks his punch with his bow, sweeps his leg out from under him. He falls, and Zayn pins his hand to the ground with an arrow. Let him move from that.

He hears the footsteps seconds before the blow comes, and that saves him; Zayn ducks and spins. Three more people have come from inside the musallah, two men and a woman, all in dark clothes. The woman follows the man who had come at him, and the two attack in some sort of concert. Zayn spares a second’s thought for the third man, who stands at the doorway, not moving, but the other two are attacking, and they aren’t that good, but they are enough that Zayn has to concentrate. He dodges, over and under and around, until finally he can get his back to a wall and his bow in his hand. One falls with an arrow in his knee. The arrow hits the woman in the side but she keeps coming; the bow hits her in the temple and she drops.

His bow is drawn and pointed at the third man before he takes his next breath. He’s tall, big in a way that speaks of strength and speed, not just beefy solidity. A beanie is pulled over his head, but his face is clear—not an extraordinary face, just a man’s face, white, with a strong jaw and a nose that’s been broken more than once. And those icy eyes, with the scar on his temple. Eyes Zayn knows. The same ones as were at the truck. And then, before that—before that, the ones that were at Zayn’s party, fucking hell. Watching.

“Impressive,” he says, holding up his hands. He doesn’t sound like he’s mocking; he sounds sincere. His accent is American, but Zayn can’t tell from where. “But your skills have always been impressive.”

“Tell me why I shouldn’t put this through your throat,” Zayn growls. He should. His hand is willing to release it. He could.

“Zed…” Louis says it carefully over the airwaves. Zayn ignores him.

“Because you don’t enjoy killing.” The man says it frankly. “And you don’t have time.”

“It would only take a second.”

“Yes, but then he would see you kill in his holy place, and that would be worse than anything we did, isn’t it?” The man jerks his head to the side, and Zayn instinctively follows his gaze.

There’s a middle aged man in a doorway Zayn hadn’t seen, probably to some sort of offices. His eyes are wide and horrified, as he takes in the scene, and Zayn’s lowering the bow, just for a second, is reflex, years of conditioning for respect in this place.

By the time Zayn’s bow is back up, facing the other man, he’s out the door, out to a car, without looking back at his men lying on the ground.

Shit. Five down, but the leader gone. Zayn turns back to the civilian—probably an imam. He has that look to him. Outside, Zayn hears sirens, coming closer. Now that everything is over.

Slowly, carefully, so it’s clear there is no threat, Zayn puts his bow behind his back, and nods to the imam.

“I am sorry.” He says it in Arabic. “As Salamu alaikum.”

Then he leaves.

“Did you kill them?” Louis asks, as Zayn watches the police arrive from a nearby rooftop. They’re talking to the man, who’s making gestures like he’s acting out the fight. Zayn’s too far away to read his lips. The five attackers are being taken out in stretchers, to a waiting ambulance.  

“No.” Maybe he should have. They'd deserve it. 

“What about the one that got away, are you going to chase him down?”

“I can’t.” There was something wrong about him. Something different from these rent-a-thugs. It’s not a coincidence he’s been all these places. He was to good, and more than that, too casual. Too smart. Too cool with an arrow pointed at his throat. And there was something in his gaze…Zayn had seen that coldness before. Killer’s eyes. Ruthless. He shouldn’t have left—why had he just left? Had he heard the sirens?

The police are taking pictures of the wall. _Terrorist scum_ it reads. Not creative. The same slurs thrown at Zayn all his life. _How many Americans dead?_

There’s nothing more he can do here. Zayn knows that. But he watches until the police drive away.

Then he leaves too, back towards his house. He’s keyed up right now, he’ll be sloppy. _Anger leads to hate, which is all well and good. But it leads to mistakes. Fight too angry, die too angry_. Slade had forgot that, and Zayn’s arrow had ended in his eye. Zayn won’t make that mistake. Not while there’s a city relying on him, even if they don’t know it.

He’s already relaxing once he gets back into his neighborhood. The bike is stashed in the garage on the other end of his property, and he’s circling around. He should sleep. Should sleep for as long as he can. Maybe if he hits a dummy for a few hours, he’ll be exhausted enough to sleep. Maybe, if he’s lucky, there won’t be nightmares. He doubts it. There are always nightmares, on the days he makes mistakes. The days he doesn’t do enough.

There is rarely anyone around this early, right on the cusp of night and morning. Zayn can avoid anyone who is, easily—no one is looking for him here. Except there’s a familiar figure coming down the street, his head ducked, earbuds in. Zayn ducks into the shadows of a tree.

“This is going to fuck my sleep schedule completely,” Louis observes. “I’m going to look exhausted tomorrow.”

“No one said you had to stay up tonight.”

“Don’t be stupid.” Louis yawns. “When Liam yells at me for not having energy, though, I’m blaming you.”

“Go home, Louis. Get some sleep.”

“Screw that. I’m crashing in your spare room. Aren’t you going to be here in a minute anyway?”

“I’ll be a little delayed. Go to sleep,” Zayn tells him, then slides the comm out of his ear. Harry’s almost upon him, and Zayn steps out of the shadows just as he’s about to pass.

“You shouldn’t be out here.”

“Fuck!” Harry jumps, one hand going to his chest, the other tugging out his earbuds. “Holy shit, you scared me!”

“Good.” Zayn stalks forward. How is Harry so stupid? He’s not stupid, Zayn knows that, but he is taking stupid risks. Who knows who’s out here, lurking like Zayn is. Maybe that man tonight, with his cold cold eyes, who looked like he’d snap a man’s neck without any thought. Who’d been at Zayn’s party, who’d seen him before. “Maybe you’ll stay home next time. It’s dangerous here.”

“Even when you’re here to save me?” Harry give shim an impish grin, and Zayn growls again. He doesn’t understand. Doesn’t know. Harry and his charmed life. “I’m feeling pretty safe.”

“You shouldn’t.” In a second, Zayn’s got his hand around Harry’s throat, his other hand twisted in Harry’s hair. It’ll hurt. He knows it will. He can feel Harry’s pulse pounding, can see how his mouth gapes open in surprise. So close. If Zayn was someone else, if he didn’t have the hood on—and that’s another stupid thing, Harry could see through this so easily, if he just _looked_ , but Zayn doesn’t care. Harry needs to stop being stupid. Harry needs to stay safe. He can’t fail Harry too. “I could kill you right now.”

“You won’t.” Harry tells him, and he’s breathless. From fear? From the way Zayn’s putting pressure on his airways? Zayn can’t tell. His eyes are wide, the pupils just a little dilated. He’s excited.

“You don’t know that.”

“You fight the bad guys. I’m not a bad guy.” Harry’s hands rise, until they’re wrapped around the hand on his throat—not pulling it away, just a careful touch, almost like how he touches Zayn, just a bit tentative.

“I could be.” This was a stupid idea. A stupid idea done in anger, and now Zayn’s made the mistake, because Harry is so close, his lips just a bit open, and if the hood was gone Zayn could kiss him right now. Kiss him and press his frustration into Harry’s skin.

He could kiss him now. Harry’s not making a secret of it. He can feel the excitement trembling in Harry’s body, how he’s shifted so he’s closer to Zayn. To the Arrow, not Zayn. He’s not even thinking about Zayn, probably. About Zayn who he thinks is asleep in his house. He doesn’t have a reason to, Zayn had been the one to say they weren’t anything. But shouldn’t he spare a thought for Zayn? For ten years of history? Or is the Arrow something Zayn can’t give him, something whole. Something without fault lines.

“You aren’t.” Harry licks his lips. If Zayn kissed him now, would he tell Zayn?

Zayn doesn’t want to know the answer. He lets go, takes a step back. Harry’s breath is loud, his chest heaving. Zayn doesn’t know what his expression means, whether it’s disappointment or fear. Zayn takes another step back. Fuck. He can’t do this. He’s still so fucking angry, at Harry, at the people he hadn’t killed in that mosque, at the leader who got away. At himself, for not being fast enough. Not being good enough. Not being enough. Failing, again and again. _It’s all your fault._

“Are you okay?” Harry asks. He looks so out of place in the shadows, with his jaunty bun and clean white shirt, all his tanned skin. He’s a creature of sunlight, of bright lights. Not the shadows. Not like Zayn is, now. All his bright lights replaced with blood.

“I’m not the only monster in the dark,” Zayn tells him, firmly as he can. “Don’t be stupid.”

“What happened?” Harry tilts his head, takes a step forward. Zayn doesn’t retreat, but he doesn’t approach him either. He doesn’t want to know.

“I didn’t get all the monsters.” It’s the only way to explain. “And I had to do something I didn’t want to to get the ones I did.” He shakes his head. He shouldn’t be here. Every word he says brings him closer to saying something that will reveal himself to Harry. A mistake. He shouldn’t have been here at all. Should just stay away from Harry. Not be so fucking selfish. “Don’t run alone this late. Or early.”

“You’re here, though.” Harry points out. “So I’m not alone.”

“That’s not keeping you safe.” Zayn steps back. “Go home. Invest in a treadmill.”

“I—” Zayn twists his body, enough that Harry follows his apparent shift in attention. When Harry looks back, it’ll look like Zayn’s gone.

Zayn watches as Harry sighs, but his lips are curving into a pleased smile. Zayn follows him all the way home before he returns to his. Louis’s already asleep, and so is Rhino, curled in his bed. Zayn doesn’t bother going up to his bed. He goes down to the gym. Dawn is coming. Maybe eventually he’ll be tired enough for a dreamless sleep.

\---

Harry’s finger is just on Zayn’s bell when the door opens. Harry stumbles backwards; Louis jumps and swears, pushing his messy hair out of his face.

“Hey!” Harry reaches back to pull on his hair, then remembers it’s underneath a beanie. He’s not doing anything wrong, but he almost feels like he is. Or maybe Louis should be. Sneaking out of Harry’s…out of Zayn’s house, like some shameful one night stand. With that in mind, “What are you doing?” he asks.

“Stayed late last night, crashed here.” Louis shrugs. “What are you doing?”

“Wanted to see Zayn.” That should be enough. “Can I—”

“He’s asleep.” Louis keeps a hand on the door. Harry’s not sure when he became Zayn’s watchdog, but it’s good, Harry supposes. That they’re back to they were at the end of Zayn’s time in One Direction, when it had felt like Louis was guarding Zayn’s interaction with the world—maybe in a hopeless effort to keep him around, Harry doesn’t know. They never talked about that.

“I could wake him up.” Harry smirks, lewdly as he can.

Louis rolls his eyes. “Yeah, go in. But he really is asleep.”

“I’ll make him breakfast in bed, then.”

“I don’t think he’ll want surprises.”

“I know.” It comes out more petulant than Harry meant it to. But he knows that. Louis is not the only one who knows this new Zayn. Harry’s the one who’s been sleeping with him. Or, well. Having sex with him and cuddling with him after. But that’s because Harry’s schedule and Zayn’s need for his own time means they’ve mainly been spending time together during the day, so there’s not a lot of time for sleeping. And Harry’s not sure Zayn’s doing anything other than sleeping for most of the day, so he isn’t much for naps.

And anyway, the point is, Harry knows Zayn. Louis isn’t the only one close to him. Harry’s the one who got him to a concert at least, who got him to hear how important he is to people. To think about music. Harry’s trying to help.

But it’s not something Harry wants to get into an argument about, so he swallows. “I’ll see you later.”

“Yeah.” Louis pauses, with his hand on the door. “Have a good night?”

It feels like a pointed question, but Harry hadn’t done anything last night. He’d been asleep early. Woke up early—but that wasn’t the night, when he’d met the Arrow. It was only a few hours ago. Harry can still feel his hand on Harry’s neck, how close they’d been. He’s not sure what the Arrow’s mood was about, but it—it was just as thrilling as it had always been. That edge of danger. But that wasn’t the night. And certainly wasn’t anything people knew about.

“Yeah,” Harry answers. “You?”

“Yeah. See you tonight.” Louis pats Harry’s shoulder as he goes.

Harry lets the door close behind him. Rhino’s outside it looks like—Louis must have let him out—and the rest of the house is quiet. Louis had said Zayn’s asleep, after all. But Harry still heads upstairs, to check. Maybe if he is asleep Harry can slide into bed with him, take a nap. He always falls asleep fast cuddled with Zayn.

The door’s the tiniest bit ajar, and Harry eases it open the rest of the way, so he won’t wake Zayn up. The bed looks empty, without any blankets on it, so his first instinct is that Zayn must have gotten up—but then he sees the floor next to the bed.

The blankets are there. It looks like Zayn’s formed some sort of nest on the floor, with a single pillow and one blanket under him, one over him. He’s hand’s fisted tightly around the end of the blanket. He looks like Zayn always did asleep, the same curve of his lips, the ways his eyelashes always look unreal against his cheeks, but—there’s a furrow on his brow, even asleep. On the floor.

He’s stirring, and Harry backs out, shuts the door quickly. He doesn’t want Zayn to wake up. He knows that much.

Other than that, though…Harry goes downstairs, because it seems like the thing to do. Zayn hadn’t looked like he’d fallen out of the bed. He’d looked like he slept there. Like he’d purposefully slept on the floor, rather than his bed.

Rhino’s barking at the door, so Harry goes to let him in. He’d dreamed of beds, Zayn had said. Of sleeping in a bed again. But he’s been back for about two months, and he’s—he’s not sleeping on a bed. Harry’s never seen him sleep on a bed, let alone sleep.

Harry sits down on the couch, takes his phone out of his pocket more out of habit than anything. He barely sees it, anyway. All he can see is Zayn on the floor. He’s sleeping on the floor. For all he’d been able to sleep anywhere, Zayn had prized his bed, even when it was just his bunk. But he’s sleeping on the floor.

It’s not like Harry hadn’t known that Zayn wasn’t who he was—that whatever had happened on the island had traumatized him, that he can’t be touched too quickly or he might react violently, that crowds set him off sometimes. But he’s sleeping on the floor, months after he got back. It didn’t even look like he’d tried to sleep on the bed. And now Harry can’t remember how many times his bed was neatly made when they fell into it, made like he never had before. He’d been hiding it. Hiding it like an addict hides their drugs.

“How’d you get in?”

The voice snaps out, and Harry jumps, fumbles his phone. “Fuck!” Harry swears. “I didn’t hear you.”

Zayn’s standing in the doorway. His hair’s messy, his cheeks a bit flushed, but there’s something wild in his gaze, in how his hands are curled into fists, his muscles tense. Like he’s ready to attack.

At Harry’s words, Zayn shrugs, and comes into the room. Harry can see all the muscles of his arms, how taut they are, even as he rubs a hand over Rhino’s head as he comes up next to him.

“How’d you get in?” Zayn repeats, softer this time. But Harry can’t not see him, curled up on the floor under a blanket like he must have slept so many times on the island. Not on the bed. Not like he’s back home.

Harry swallows, stands up. Somehow it doesn’t feel right to be sitting down when Zayn’s standing. “Louis was leaving when I came in. He let me in.” Maybe Harry’s wrong. Maybe this is a one time thing. Maybe Zayn did fall off the bed. “Are you okay?”

“Fine.” Zayn rolls his neck, working out the kinks. “Just woke up. Are you okay?”

He didn’t mention the floor. He never had. How much else wasn’t he saying? How much deeper did his pain run? Harry’d thought he’d seen it, but maybe he’d been being blind, stupid. Thinking that Zayn’s not creating was the extent of it.

He could cut and run now. He doesn’t have any real reason to be here, not one that he couldn’t leave. Couldn’t explain away.

Instead, Harry finds himself mumbling something else. “Um. Yeah. I just…” he runs a hand through his hair. He can’t not say anything. Zayn’s hurting, it’s very very clear. Clearer now than ever. He never wants to see Zayn hurt. Even during the worst of it, when he was so angry at Zayn for leaving, he was wishing he could stop his hurt. “Do you want coffee? Tea?”

Zayn’s eyes narrow, and there’s something dangerous in that. Something predatory, and not in the good way, when he looked at Harry like he’s ready to pounce. This is something piercing, something that makes Harry want to insist he isn’t prey. “I want you to tell me what’s wrong.”

He couldn’t stop Zayn’s hurt before. But maybe he can now. Harry nods to himself. He’d wanted to get Zayn to a concert, to help him readjust. This is just more of that. “Come over here.”

“Why?” Zayn’s still looking at him warily. Like a cornered animal.

“Because I don’t want to have this conversation across a room.” Harry sighs, then reaches out slowly to take Zayn’s hand. They’ve always done better with physical contact. And he knows this won’t be an easy conversation. Interventions never are. “I don’t bite, Zayn.”

“Sure you do,” Zayn replies quickly, and it’s enough to make Harry grin. To remind him that this Zayn maybe have gone through things Harry can’t imagine, may be more messed up than he had thought, but he’s still Zayn. Still the same person underneath it all, like he’d always been.

He lets Harry lead him back to the couch. Sitting on a chair would be too far away, so Harry sits on the coffee table, fitting himself between Zayn’s legs. It says something about the serious turn this morning has taken that he barely spares a thought for how he’s sitting, how if Zayn had already been awake this morning he’d be doing something much more fun between Zayn’s legs now. Zayn would have hid it another day.

“Okay.” Harry takes a breath. He needs to figure out how to phrase this so he won’t push too far and make everything worse. “So, I looked into your room this morning, when you were sleeping.”

There’s a flicker in Zayn’s eyes, something that looks like fear, or maybe confusion. “Creepy.”

“Not—I just wanted to see if you were really asleep.” Harry’s hands are on his knees now, but Zayn’s still, almost preternaturally so. A deer in headlights. Or a cat about to strike. Harry gulps down air again, but he has to ask. He can’t not ask. He can’t let it go. “Zayn, why were you sleeping on the floor?”

There’s that flicker in Zayn’s eyes again, but he meets Harry’s eyes almost too squarely, in a way Harry usually associates with bravado. “The bed’s too soft.”

“I thought you said you dreamed of a bed.” He’d said that. So wistfully, like he was still dreaming of it.

Zayn’s closing off, though. That at least looks the same as it always had, his back straightening, his face going cold. “I did. But I guess I was wrong.” He goes to get up, but Harry catches his wrists before he can. He can’t let Zayn leave. Can’t let him run away from this. “Harry…”

“Zayn. You need to sleep on a bed.” Harry says it as firmly as he can, rubs his thumb over Zayn’s pulse, for one of their comfort. “You can’t sleep on the floor.”

“Why not?” It comes out biting, aggressive. Zayn always attacked when he was on the defense, but there’s something even sharper to this. Something that feels like that cornered animal again.

So Harry tries to stay calm, though the worry is swirling in him, worry and a bit of anger, that Zayn’s being obstinate, that he concealed this. “Don’t be stupid. You’ve been hiding this, you know why not.”

“No, tell me,” Zayn demands. His jaw is set in its more stubborn lines. The lines it gets in when he knew he was doing something wrong and was going to do it anyway rather than listen to reason. “Why can’t I sleep on the floor if I want to?”

And that’s just it. “Because you aren’t on the island anymore!” Harry snaps, and in his annoyance, his hands tighten on Zayn’s wrist.

It happens in an instant. One second, Harry’s hands are on Zayn’s; in the next, Zayn’s yanking away and then his hands are on Harry’s wrists, tight enough that Harry cries out in pain and surprise.

Harry catches a single glance of Zayn’s face, the blankness of his eyes, then just as suddenly he’s dropping Harry’s hands and scrambling back into the couch, as far away from Harry as he can get.

For a second, they stare at each other, Harry’s hands still suspended where Zayn let them go, Zayn pressed into the couch. That cornered animal fierceness is gone from his eyes, and now it’s just the pain—the pain he’d been hiding, maybe. Pain, and fear, a real deep fear, the sort of fear that makes children scared of monsters under their bed.

Harry takes a breath. He should have known better than to push Zayn like that. He’s not Harry’s Zayn anymore, not twenty and golden. He’s hurt, maybe a bit dangerous in the way a injured dog is dangerous. And Harry wants to stop that.

He lets his hands drop back to his knees. “You aren’t on the island anymore,” He repeats, softer now. He just—he needs Zayn to get it. To get that he needs to try to get better. That Harry wants him better, wants him to stop hurting. “We can get you a firmer mattress, or figure that out somehow. But you need to sleep on the bed. You’re off the island.”

He tries to keep Zayn’s gaze, but he won’t look at Harry. Instead, slowly, carefully, he uncurls, reaching out for Harry’s wrist with a glance up at Harry like he’s afraid he’s going to run away. There is a part of Harry that wants to jerk away from him. That is afraid of the violence in Zayn now, that unthinking blankness. But this is Zayn, and Harry won’t let himself be afraid of him. Just for him.

So he stays still, and lets Zayn take Harry’s wrist, turn it over to inspect where he had grabbed. His touch is tentative, almost unbearably gentle, as if he could undo what he’d done with that touch alone. As if he’s scared he’ll hurt Harry this way too.

“See?” Harry has to smile, at the gentleness in Zayn’s touch. He’s still him. He’ll always be him, and at the core Zayn takes care of people. Zayn protects. “No harm done.”

Zayn strokes his finger over the red of Harry’s skin. His voice is very quiet. “I don’t think I am. Off the island, I mean.” He looks up at Harry, his whole expression pleading, his eyes huge and his brow furrowed. Like he needs Harry to hear more than what he’s saying. “I don’t think I can ever leave it.”

Harry’s not entirely sure what Zayn needs him to hear. All he can see is the pain, and the fear. He shifts his grip, so he’s holding Zayn’s hands now, then brings them up to his lips. He kisses the knuckles on one hand, then the other, his gaze fixed on Zayn as he does. He never wanted Zayn to hurt. He can help. He will help. He’ll get him home again.

“I do,” he says, simply, and holds Zayn’s hands tight. He has to believe it. Has to believe that Zayn will come back to him, bruised and battered but whole again.


	8. Chapter 7

“Harry! Louis! Look here!” Harry raises his hand, waves at the paparazzi, gives his best smile. He keeps smiling, as he looks around for the car, as the mob grows, and can feel Louis doing the same. It’s sort of nice, that even ten years after One Direction started, they can still pull crowds like this. Even when they were called, because apparently them going to the Nice Guy is still big news. He really hopes it’s not bigger because it was him and Louis today, just because they wanted to go out and get some drinks and do some promo.

“Shit.” Next to him, Jeff swears. “Something messed up with the cars, they’ll be late.”

Harry keeps smiling. He’s gotten mobbed before properly, this isn’t a problem. “Should we go back in?”

“Should we just run?” Louis mutters, from his other side. “Or call the fucking Arrow to get rid of them?”

Harry snorts. “Would that even work?”

“Probably not.” Louis gives another pleased smile that looks more like a grimace. “I’m never getting drinks with you again, Styles.”

“If you’d wanted to just get a drink, you wouldn’t have gone to paparazzi central,” Nadia, Louis’s PA, says from his other side. She’s flicking through her phone, with the sort of decisive competence Harry admires. She’s certainly kept Louis’s life in order for the past few years, and no one else other than his mother has really managed to do that.

“We can multi-task.” Louis retorts, and she lifts her gaze just to give him an unimpressed look. It’s a very good unimpressed look, probably made better because it’s in a face that could best be identified as cute, with a sharp chin and her dark hair in a pixie cut that brings out cheekbones almost as good as Zayn’s. Harry’s always vaguely admired Louis’s bravery, hiring a cute girl to be his PA.

“Oh really? So then why haven’t you signed—”

“We need to move.” Jeff cuts her off. Nadia transfers the unimpressed look to Jeff, who ignores her. “Nadia, Louis—”

“Yeah.” Her and Jeff both make some unintelligible hand motions to the bodyguards, then they’re making a path, and Harry and Jeff are being taken one way and Nadia and Louis the other. A few moments later, Harry and Jeff are on the side street off to one side of the building, and, given the roar of noise, someone more interesting than half of One Direction must have left.

“Car’ll be here in a few. Sorry.” Jeff pushes a few more buttons on his phone, then puts it in his pocket.

Harry shrugs. It’s not a big deal. “As long as it’s not a bread van.”

Jeff grins. He leans back against the wall, either more daring than Harry or less caring about his shirt. “Are you okay?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you seem distracted.”

“What, that being at a club doesn’t take my full attention?” Harry replies, chuckling. He doesn’t particularly want to talk about how he’s thinking about Zayn. Wondering if he’d taken what Harry said into consideration. He’d said he’d try to sleep in his bed that night, but he’d hidden things before, Harry’s not sure he trusts him. The forums online say it might be best not to. “I was in the moment. I am the moment.”

“Harry.” Harry doesn’t know why he surrounds himself with people who don’t fall for his shit anymore.

“I am the embodiment of the moment,” Harry keeps going anyway. “There is nothing but the moment.”

“Oh, shut up.” Jeff’s phone buzzes, and he pulls it out of his pocket to look at it again. “Louis and Nadia are in the car. They have to go around to pick us up, it’ll be a few more minutes.”

“Good. I can enjoy the moment more.”

Jeff rolls his eyes. “I just meant—”

It all happens in a moment. Jeff’s teasing Harry, then there’s someone there, someone big and masked and he’s shoved Harry to the ground and is pushing Jeff against the wall as Harry stares, big eyed. Jeff’s breath wooshes out of him, and Harry doesn’t know if he should scream or if that’d get them killed—

“You were supposed to be better,” the big man rumbles. “You were supposed to let them—”

Then there’s another blur, and the Arrow is landing on the ground, rolling up to his feet and barreling into the man in one motion, knocking him away from Jeff. Jeff falls to the ground, rubbing his neck, and Harry would run to his side but the Arrow’s between them, his bow flashing out to smack into the man’s side. The man stumbles, and the Arrow’s driving him back, away from Harry, away from Jeff. It must be loud, the paparazzi will be coming, the Arrow won’t want this—

“Get in the car,” the Arrow barks, without looking. Harry looks behind them; there is a car there. “Both of you. In the car.”

“But—” Harry should stay, should call the police, should make sure he’s okay—

“Get him in the car,” the Arrow snaps, and he’s still moving almost too fast too see, a blur of motion, the big man’s fists moving around him, and Harry doesn’t know if he’s talking to Jeff or him, but—Jeff. This isn’t about watching the Arrow fight, fight for Harry.

“Come on.” Harry turns away from the fight. Jeff’s still on the ground, clutching at his throat. “Here, you okay?”

“Yeah, I think so.” Despite that, Jeff leans on Harry as he gets up, as Harry helps him to the car to the sounds of flesh on leather, on flesh. As they get to the car, Louis throws open the door, helps Jeff in.

Harry turns back, before he gets in. The man’s down, his face dark with blood, and the Arrow’s standing over him, his shoulders heaving. His bow is in his hand, undrawn, and as Harry watches he deliberately slams his fist one more time into the man’s head, so it lolls back.

“Harry!” Louis snaps.

As if the Arrow hears that, he turns, looks at Harry. He’s all shadows here, shadows and the limp body behind him, but Harry thinks he can feel his gaze, feel it burn over him. Feel it burn in him.

“He’s not dead. Go. There could be more,” the Arrow orders.

“Who—”

“Go!” The Arrow barks, and then someone’s got a hand in the back of Harry’s shirt and is pulling him in, and he goes. The Arrow’s still standing there as the car pulls away, watching them go; the last sight Harry has of him is him drawing his bow.

“Police will be there soon,” Nadia announces, and right, they’re in the car. Other people are here. Jeff is here.

“Are you okay?” Harry asks Jeff again. Louis’s typing something on his phone, as is Nadia, but Jeff is leaning against the back of the car, massaging his throat. “Fucking hell, Jeff—”

“I’m fine. I think.” Jeff shudders. “What was that?”

“I don’t know.” Harry shakes his head. “I didn’t—like, I’ve gotten mugged, but I didn’t think you’d—or so close—”

“Should we go to the hospital?” Nadia interrupts.

“No. No, I’m—the Arrow got there soon enough.” Despite what he says, Jeff’s still rubbing at his throat. But Harry can’t see any marks. “And I don’t want more people to know about this than do already.”

“We should just get him home,” Harry decides. “Go there first, please,” he tells the drives, who grunts in agreement. “I’ll let Glenne know,” Harry turns back to Jeff. “Or do you not want her to?”

“I’ll tell her. Don’t want her to worry.” Jeff shakes his head, then he rolls his shoulders back, pulls out his phone. “We’re all getting more bodyguards. We were lucky the Arrow was around today. I was lucky. I don’t know why I’ve let you put that off, Harry. We’re hiring them tomorrow.” Harry puts a hand on his knee. It’s trembling, despite the deliberateness with which he’s texting.

“Lucky,” Louis mutters. “I want to know why someone’s attacking people around Harry and me.”

“And you?” Harry echoes. “Who—”

“It’s been fine so far.” Louis shrugs. He’s still on his phone. “But this is too often to be a coincidence.”

“Like the Arrow being there every time is a coincidence?”

“He didn’t do it!” Harry snaps at Nadia. She raises perfectly arched eyebrows.

“I didn’t say he did.” She purses her lips. “I’m just saying that he’s always there.”

“Haven’t you heard?” Harry manages a smile. “He’s One Direction’s biggest fan.”

“No, I’m pretty sure he’s not Niall,” Louis adds, and it’s like that breaks the tension—everyone laughs, even Jeff.

They do drop Jeff off first, and Harry makes sure he gets into Glenne’s care before he leaves, promising to check in on him tomorrow. Nadia and Louis are muttering about something when he gets back in the car. Another day, Harry might comment on the few centimeters less than proper between them, but now’s not the time. Now, he just leans back against the car, stares out the window.

Jeff got hurt. Jeff almost got hurt, at least, and it was because of him. He knows it was because of him, Louis’s right, it’s not a coincidence. This is the third time. The third time that something bad could have happened to Harry, if the Arrow wasn’t there. And the worst part of it, the part Harry buries deep, is that there’s a thrill there, despite the risk, the pain, the fact that his friend got hurt. A thrill at that danger. At the adrenaline rush. At the Arrow appearing out of nowhere. It’s fucked up, and he shouldn’t like it. He doesn’t. He wishes it wasn’t happening. He does.

But he’s also self-aware enough to know that he’s not just shaking from fear.

“Are you okay?” Louis demands. Harry blinks, and focuses on him.

“Yeah.”

“You’re bleeding.” Nadia points out, then goes back to her phone.

“What?”

“Fuck, you are.” Louis grabs Harry’s hands, and it’s like a flashback, to how Zayn had held Harry’s wrists earlier.

“I just skinned them a bit.” Harry pulls his hands away, puts them palm up on his lap. There’s no point getting his clothes bloody. “It’s fine.”

“Fuck that. Nadia—”

“I’m looking into it. It’ll be better at home.” Nadia actually moves a hand away from her phone to put it on Louis’s knee. “I better be getting overtime for all these extras.”

“It’ll be in your Christmas bonus.”

“My Thanksgiving bonus.”

“You don’t—”

“I should, now.”

“Greedy bitch.”

“I prefer the term opportunistic.”

Harry ignores their bickering, going back to looking out the window. They’re getting close to his house, but he doesn’t want to go back. Doesn’t want to be alone, doesn’t want to sit there in his thoughts. Maybe Liam has a point about that relationship thing; Jeff had gone into Glenne’s arms, and Harry had seen how she’d stroked his cheek, how Jeff had relaxed when she’d wrapped her arms around her. He wouldn’t mind that now, he thinks. Someone to lean on. Someone to tell him he’s okay.

They turn the corner onto Zayn’s street, and Harry catches the faint sight of lights on in the house, far back. He thinks one of those is Zayn’s bedroom.

“You can drop me off here.”

“What?” Louis stops his banter to narrow his eyes at Harry. “Here?”

“At Zayn’s.”

Louis presses his lips together. “It’s almost three. He’s probably asleep.”

“If he is, I’ll walk home. It’s five minutes.”

“Harry, you can’t just—”

“Drop me off here,” Harry interrupts, as firmly as he can, and Louis raises his hands in defeat.

He gets out of the car with a promise to text Louis if he does end up walking home, and a nod to Nadia. It feels less stuffy, out of the car, on Zayn’s stoop. Even though he doesn’t know what the shadows here hold, it’s easier. In the open air, with the night above him.

And then Zayn’s opening the door. He’s in sweatpants and a simple white t-shirt, his hair messy. “Didn’t expect to see you tonight.”

Harry stares for a second, just takes him in. How had he lasted so long without Zayn? The Arrow still thrills in him, gets his adrenaline racing, but Zayn’s different. Zayn’s always been different. Even when he’d lashed out, with him is still the safest Harry’s ever felt.

“Harry?”

“Can I come in?”

Zayn glances behind him, then at the car still idling outside the gates, then nods. “Yeah. ‘Course.”

“Thank you.” Zayn steps away, then closes the door behind Harry when he comes in. He sheds his boots, then his coat, hangs them up. Zayn just waits, as Harry does that; waits in silence. He’s always done that, for Harry. Let him be quiet when he needed to be. Let him tell things on his own time.

And he does want to talk about it, he thinks, maybe—but first he needs someone there. Needs Zayn there. So he goes to him, and he knows he’s not moving as slowly as he should, as carefully, but he just—he needs him. And Zayn doesn’t flinch away, doesn’t react, other than to let Harry kiss him, long and slow, rubbing up and down his arms like he knows this is about comfort, not the kiss, not really.

“Hey. You okay?”

Harry shakes his head. The one thing annoying about Zayn is no matter how much buffer he is now, he’s still shorter. Harry can’t quite curl up in him like he wants, like he had back at the bungalow when the world was too big.

“No. Can we go to bed?”

He can see Zayn swallow, but he nods. “Yeah. Come on.”

Harry watches his back as they go upstairs. Not even in the way he often likes to watch Zayn’s back as he moves, looking at his tapered waist and his ass and all that. Just…Zayn. With the feather peaking out at his neck and the solidity of his shoulders. For all Zayn’s moods, for all that he left, he’d always seemed so solid. So sure. Harry’s never really been sure.

In the bedroom, Harry carefully strips off his jeans, his shirt. The blankets on the floor he had seen Zayn sleeping in are on the bed now, like he’d put them there after he woke up. It makes Harry’s heart ache, Zayn curled up on the floor like he was still there. Still lost. He doesn’t want Zayn to be lost. He wants Zayn with him. That, he is sure of.

Zayn doesn’t take anything off. He never does, which is a weird change from before, when Harry’s pretty sure he didn’t own shirts, given his instagram, but maybe that’s a relic of the island as well. Conserving heat, or something. Harry doesn’t even mind. He wants Zayn, wants to see all of him, wants to learn him again in the way he never quite could before, but right now he just wants Zayn, however he can get him.

Zayn gets into bed first, then Harry climbs in after, and now he can curl himself into Zayn, dip his head into the crook of his neck, breathe in the scent of him. It’s not what it was, five years ago, but it’s still Zayn.

“There was another attack.” The words feel like they come from far away. “Jeff and I, we were in an alley…someone choked him. Or would have, if the Arrow hadn’t come.”

Zayn’s arms tighten around Harry. “But he came, yeah?”

“Yeah. He came. But…” Harry shakes his head. Zayn’s fingers are twisting the ends of his hair, and it’s almost hypnotic. Distracting, definitely. “Jeff could have gotten hurt. Really hurt. I could have. It hasn’t… I don’t know, this isn’t the first time, but it never sunk in before. That if the Arrow hadn’t come I could be dead.”

Zayn hums. “First time someone almost killed me, I puked. So you’re doing better than me.”

Harry lifts his head. Zayn’s so matter-of-fact about it. “The first time?”

“Yeah.”

“There were others?”

Zayn’s lips twist. “Yeah.”

“What—” Harry swallows. “What happened?”

“That first time?” Zayn presses his lips together, then he looks away, over Harry’s head. “It was my first day, on the island, I just—I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Someone who didn’t want me on the island found me.”

“How’d you get away?” It’s distracting, listening to this. Distracting, and…and comforting. Zayn’s gone through this. He’s not alone. Zayn went through so much worse and has come out on the right side.

“Someone saved me. He…” Now it’s Zayn’s voice is hoarse. “He saved me a lot.” Now it’s his turn to shake his head. “Point is, it’s never easy, the first time you realize you might die. But you won’t.” The hand on Harry’s hair tightens, almost painful. The tug of it burns right, though. Burns like a promise, like how Zayn’s touch always used to. “You won’t.”

“I’m going to die eventually. Unless you want to share your secret to eternal life.”

“Harry.” Zayn’s hand is on Harry’s chin now, tilting it up. “Harry, look at me.”

With his hand there, Harry’s can’t not, and…he’s seen Zayn look like this before, but he never dreamed it would be about him. He’s seen him look like this writing, seen him when he was alight with something he believed in, when he was furious at something, but Harry never dreamed he’d get this. That he could get Zayn looking at him like the world could burn and he wouldn’t look away. Like all the passion he’s been keeping locked up since he got back was pointing right at Harry now. “You’ll be safe. I promise.”

Harry lets out a long, shaky breath, but the words…fuck, they help. They really do. He doesn’t know how Zayn will do it, but he believes he can. “Well, you did keep me safe for four years on stage,” he jokes, because he loves Zayn’s intensity but he needs to break it right now. Needs to breath.

It gets the smile out of Zayn, that passion fading. “Yeah.” He moves his hand from Harry’s chin, to run it through his hair, and Harry catches sight of red on the knuckles. “I—”

“Are you okay?” Harry grabs for his hand, turns it over. The knuckles are bruised, a little bloody. “What…”

“Boxing.” Zayn closes his fist, then gently pulls it away from Harry. “I was boxing.”

Harry hums. “You need to wrap your hands better, then.”

“Don’t need to be pretty for a stage anymore.”

“Well, you need to be pretty for me.” Harry tries to make it sexy, but a yawn breaks out instead. It is almost three.

“You need to sleep. It’ll help.”

Harry opens his mouth, then closes it, but there’s no good way to ask. “Will you be able to?”

Zayn shrugs. “Probably not. I’ll move, when—”

Harry cuts him off by rolling over to straddle Zayn’s hips. He might be in danger for his life. But if Zayn can swear he’s keeping Harry safe, Harry can swear he’ll help Zayn here. He’ll keep Zayn safe from his own head.

Zayn’s brow furrows, almost in confusion, as he looks up at Harry. He looks so fucking gorgeous like this. Soft like this, he could be twenty again, him and Harry playfighting and pushing at the boundaries of how far they could go. They don’t have those boundaries, now, and Harry smirks, as he leans down to kiss Zayn. He waits until he’s a whisper away to murmur, “Let’s see if I can tire you out, then.”

Zayn snorts, but the confusion melts into a smile. “You can try your best.”

\---

When they’re done, when Harry’s ridden Zayn until he’s exhausted at least, and Zayn’s sagged back into the blankets looking spent and fucked out, his shirt stained with sweat and his shoulders relaxed, Harry cuddles back into him, wraps his arms around him.

“Stay?” he murmurs, on the cusp of sleep. The room is dark, and Zayn is all shadows, but he feels warm and solid and safe. Feels like he would burn the world to keep Harry safe, like he’ll keep the monsters away.

Pressed against him, Harry can feel Zayn tense up, then breathe out. “Yeah,” he sighs. “Yeah, okay.”

\---

Zayn wakes with the sun on his face and the warmth of a body against him. It’s so unfamiliar he almost jerks out of bed sure it’s a trick—but then Harry snuffles against his shoulder, and he takes a deep breath. It’s not a trick. He just slept in a bed last night. Slept dreamless, with Harry close to him. It was a stupid idea, he knew it, but he couldn’t refuse, not when Harry was scared. Not when Harry was scared because he wasn’t fast enough. And now Harry was fine. Safe.

He opens his eyes to look at Harry. His hair’s spread out behind him, his mouth slightly open and a bit of drool hanging out at the corner. He’d always been a messy sleeper, even if he never liked to admit it. Zayn had loved it, once. How all of the rough edges of Harry that he hid so well when awake came out in sleep.

Now, he just smiles. He slept. He slept, and Harry’s fine. Maybe he can do this. Maybe he can hide his broken edges still.

He untangles himself from Harry as gently as he can, though it’s harder than getting out of some chokeholds he’s been in. Harry makes discontented noises when he’s finally out, but then he sprawls out over the bed and starts to snore. Zayn snorts, and pads to the bathroom.

Downstairs, he lets Rhino out, then goes to the kitchen. He wants to cook. Maybe he’ll remember how.

Harry stumbles downstairs half an hour later. He pauses in the doorway, looking at Zayn’s back as he finishes up with the eggs, for a good few minutes, until Zayn starts getting too disturbed by the feeling of his eyes on Zayn and turns around.

“Why are you staring?”

Harry’s a picture like this too, in just his boxers with his hair tied back. He’s not in deadly shape, but he’s still solid, and soft like he doesn’t have to be hard everywhere. And his dimples are deep in his cheek as he grins, comes over to wrap his hands around Zayn’s shoulders. “You were singing.”

“I was?” Zayn hadn’t even noticed.

“Yeah.” Harry pecks at his lips, and Zayn can still feel his smile. “I’ve missed your voice.”

“I’ve been talking.”

Harry rolls his eyes. “I’ve missed hearing you sing.” There’s more to that statement, Zayn knows, but he doesn’t want to ask. Not now. Not when he slept in a bed last night. Not when there wasn’t a nightmare. Not when he’d told Harry things he’d never told anyone before, and he’s still here. “What are you making me?”

“Eggs.” Zayn tells him, and turns back around to tend them. Harry stays draped over his back as he cooks, his breath steady on Zayn’s neck.

\---

“I’ve got—shit.”

“What?” Zayn pulls himself up one more rung on the salmon ladder, looking down at Louis where he’s standing in the doorway. He’s got a laptop under one arm, but he’s just staring up at Zayn.

“Sometimes I forget you’re ripped now.” Louis shakes his head, like he’s clearing it. “But I have the warehouse info.”

“Good.” It’s about time. Zayn drops back to the floor, grabs a towel to wipe off the sweat. It’s been days. If nothing’s been done to follow up with the bombs yet they’re probably okay, and Zayn is fairly sure the police lockup will try to keep them safe, but he wants to know the threat. He doesn’t know what Charles’s list means, but this he can figure out. “What is it?”

“Corey Duberman.” Louis sets the laptop down, opens his computer. “He’s a real estate developer, among other things. He owns the warehouse.”

Zayn leans over Louis’s shoulder to look at the picture. He’s a middle aged white guy, his hair slightly balding, his paunch a little overgrown. There’s nothing defining about him. Zayn’s seen dozens of this man.

“Is there anything else?”

“Nadia made a file.” He clicks on another icon.

Zayn scans it. Property development, nothing fishy there, only bits of the usual corner cutting and scams. A family man, the perfect suburban home, a Stepford Wives wife and two blonde kids. Then it sets in, the name Louis’s used. He knows Louis’s Nadia.

“And she doesn’t know…”

“No, of course not,” Louis snaps, but there’s no heat behind it. The question of why Louis’s personal assistant is also a hacker can wait. “I can’t see why he’d want bombs, though.”

“Someone could have paid him to store them there.” Zayn hums, scrolling through. There are a few articles about him, generally just connecting him to the building of new hotels, new developments. A picture of him with Donald Trump, which isn’t a crime, though it’s distasteful. Donations to the NRA. Nothing interesting, for a man from middle America. Nothing really. “Shit.”

“Yeah. I was hoping for ties to terrorists.”

So was Zayn, to be honest. “We’ll keep looking. I’ll do some digging.” There has to be a reason for this.

“Should you?” Louis raises his eyebrows. “Should we let him know we know the bombs were going to him?”

“I’ll be subtle.”

“Subtle like an arrow in their hand?”

Zayn shrugs, and turns away. “I have other means.” It might be time to talk to the Bratva. Zayn had hoped it wouldn’t come to that—it’d be too easy for them to know who he is, to spread it around—but he needs to know more, and no one knows the underworld like the Russian mafia.

“And until then?”

Zayn pulls his hood out of the trunk. “We hunt.”

\---

“You’re an old hat about all of this, of course.” The interviewer says, and Harry hums his assent. He’s only had radio interviews for a while, which are nice because he doesn’t have to go anywhere for them, can do them lying on Zayn’s bed with Zayn’s head on his lap, but he’d missed the camera on him. “But so are your fans. So what’s different about this album?”

“We say this every time, but I do think this is the most mature album we’ve had,” Liam answers. He’s smiling too, but Harry can tell he’s tired. It’s late and they’ve been doing these interviews all day. It’s not like back the first time around, when they’d have days and days of this while on tour, but they aren’t seventeen anymore either, and there’s not the tour adrenaline to run off of. “You know, with this one we’ve got one of us married, another with a son—we’re not kids anymore, and I think that shows in the sort of themes we’re tackling.”

“So no more songs about being tied down?” The interviewer asks, and Harry smirks.

“We never said that,” he drawls, and gets the interviewer to blush a pretty pink as Liam snorts next to him. “We’re not all married yet. And even if you are married, it doesn’t mean—”

“We have a balance!” Liam interrupts him, which Harry thinks is a pity, because he’s pretty sure Liam and Diana’s sex life is plenty active and probably a bit kinky. He’s always been vaguely curious about that, in the same way he’s always curious about other people, and Liam had never been one to kiss and tell. Not like Zayn, who’d let Harry pry him open with questions about what a shag had been like, his eyes dark as he looked at Harry, like a challenge. It had always ended in Harry leaving for a quick, desperate wank, wondering what it would be like if he was there instead, so maybe in retrospect it makes sense Zayn would let him ask. But Liam never told. It was very disappointing. “But a higher proportion of songs are about a different sort of love than what we were writing about five years ago.”

“So you think those were immature?”

“No, it’s not—” Liam shakes his head. “That was where we were when we wrote them. But there’s all sorts of love, and it’s not all No Control, you know? So this album has more about the sort of love that’s less desperate, but more secure.”

Harry keeps his smile on his face, nods along. He’s right, that is what the album is more about, because it was Liam and Louis writing more of it and that’s where they’ve gone, which is fine. It might not be what Harry’s songs are about, but balance is good, and ever since Zayn left they’d been obsessive about making sure everyone was okay with the direction the albums were going. Harry’s other songs are for him, or the other singers he’s sold them too, and that’s fine.

“And you?” The interviewer turns to Harry. “You aren’t married, and the rumor is you just broke up with your girlfriend. Is it hard to sing songs you don’t have the experience to match?”

“If it was hard for us to do that, we couldn’t sing half our songs,” Harry replies, evenly. “I’ve never loved someone named Diana, for instance, but Liam could apparently see the future.”

“So then, there’s no wedding bells in the future for you?” The interviewer jokes, and Harry knows it’s a joke, he does. But he suddenly flashes to this morning, when he’d woken up with Zayn’s mouth on his neck, his whole body curled into Harry like he was afraid he’d disappear if he let go. He hadn’t been there when Harry went to sleep, had been out with Louis, but they’d woken up together anyway, and Harry had looked down at Zayn’s sleeping face, how unlined and calm it was, peaceful like he never looked awake anymore. And for a second, a second Harry’d never taken before, he’d imagined—he’d imagined twenty years from now, Zayn going grey, still curled up against Harry as the morning sun broke over them both. It hadn’t even been surprising, which was the most surprising thing. Harry had always imagined a future with Zayn, and it had always terrified him.

“No,” he replies, stretching out his legs. “Nah, I’ve got plenty more to do before I settle down.”

“And plenty more projects, right?” The interviewer’s shifted away from Liam, focusing all on Harry now. “Your new movie comes out soon, doesn’t it?”

“It’s not my movie,” Harry demurs, “I’m just a supporting role.” He’d never quite gotten to lead role in movies. Never wanted that particularly. It would take too much time.

“Still, that’s a big jump, even if it’s one you’ve made before. Is it hard, the shift from musician to actor?”

“Nah, not really. Maybe the first time it was, but I’ve always been used to the cameras, and the writing was really good, it hardly felt like acting at all. And I’m used to being told what to do.” Harry gives a cheeky smile, and Liam groans as the interviewer laughs. “I’ve been lucky with all the filmmakers I’ve worked with, though. It’s been a lot of fun. And the people were a treat, they’re all great, none of them made fun of me like the lads do.”

“We only do it because you deserve it,” Liam tells him, patting him on the knee.

“I do not!” Harry protests, and the interviewer laughs.

“The movie, Never Forget, is about a reporter who decides to take revenge into his own hands when his sister’s abuse case is dismissed, and he has to delve into the darkest parts of himself to do it. You play, what, his cousin?”

“His brother,” Harry corrects. Liam’s shifting next to him, but they’ve found that this sort of thing is inevitable, and the cross-promotion works. It’s the price they paid for branching out. All of this will probably be cut anyway. “It’s a great role. I’m the successful musician who he always feels like he has to live up to.” He gives a lopsided smile. “Told you it was barely acting.”

“Does the film have any more resonance now, do you think? With the Arrow out there?” Harry feels himself perk up, at the mention of the Arrow. “And I know you’re the Arrow’s main mouthpiece, so do you think there’s a relation?”

“I’m not his mouthpiece,” Harry protests. He’s just…talked to the Arrow a few times. A few more times, really, when Harry’s out late and the Arrow finds him. Harry doesn’t know if he is special in that, really; maybe other people know more about him, maybe he talks to other people in that gravelly voice, with his whole body taut with energy. Maybe he flies to the rescue of other people. Maybe there are other people who soothe him, as Harry thinks he does, by joking and laughing and listening, and, once or twice, a gentle touch to his arms, that seems to make the Arrow relax. “We’ve just run into each other once in a while.”

“I’m proper jealous,” Liam puts in. He scoots closer to Harry, presses his knee against Harry’s in a quiet level of support. “I always wanted to be Jimmy Olsen, if I couldn’t be Superman.”

“So you condone what he’s doing? In the past week, there have been ten serious injuries attributed to him, and who knows how many more unreported.” The interviewer is leaning forward, clearly sensing a story here. Harry can see the headlines. One Direction For Vigilante Justice! There’s a flashback to Zayn’s old headlines, some of the worst ones that had made him go downstairs with Liam to box, punching at a bag until he was exhausted and one of them could coax him back up. “Is he doing good?”

“That’s not our job to judge,” Liam jumps in. “We—”

“He’s trying,” Harry interrupts. Liam’s eyes go big as he looks at Harry, big and worried, but he needs to set this straight. He knows they should stay neutral, but Liam hasn’t heard the Arrow when there were people he didn’t get to fast enough. When he couldn’t do enough. “I’m not saying he should hurt people, or go around the courts—which he isn’t, he leaves the criminals for the police—but he’s trying to help people. And he’s helped me.” There, the interviewer can have her sound byte. Harry will stand by it, even with Liam’s hand tight on his knee like a warning. “I don’t know about the rest of the band, and I’m not speaking for them. But he saved my life. And I condone that.”

He leans back in his chair, raises an eyebrow at the interviewer as a dare to press him more, and sure enough, she doesn’t. She doesn’t need to.

The rest of the interview goes by in a bit of a predictable blur, then they’re off, and the interviewer is thanking them before they’re herded back into a green room.

“That,” Liam says, the moment the door shuts behind them.

“I know it was stupid.” Harry interrupts. He doesn’t need Liam yelling at him for telling the truth.

“It was,” Liam agrees. “And you should call Jeff because he’ll have something to say. I was going to say unexpected, though. It’s not how you usually are in interviews.”

Harry shrugs. Sure enough, his phone is buzzing already; someone must have told Jeff. “It had to be said.” He holds up a hand to stop Liam from talking, then pulls out his phone. “Jeffy!” he answers, brightly. “Did you like my interview?”

\---

Harry gets home hours later. It’s not too late to call Zayn, but it’s not not too late either, and Harry wants to let him sleep. He doesn’t think Zayn sleeps much, despite what he’d thought before about sleeping the day away; Zayn’s almost always awake when he calls, and he’s almost always up before Harry is. At least he’s sleeping in the bed now, which Harry’s taking as a win. That, and Harry’s caught him singing a few more times, offhand old Usher songs while he’s distracted.

So instead of calling Zayn, he goes home. He doesn’t bother to turn on the lights as he goes through to his bedroom in the back of the main floor. Most of the construction right now is upstairs anyway, redoing some of the guest bedrooms; he’d done his master bedroom first, years ago. Well, he’s done it a few times, but it’s done now, the light airy feel he likes, with his big bed for him to fall into. He’s looking forward to that. So he doesn’t turn on his lights, doesn’t really pay much attention—until he looks up at there’s a figure silhouetted against the plate glass windows facing the yard, silhouetted from the inside.

Harry screams. He’s never telling anyone, but he can’t help it, how he screams and scrambles backwards, looking for something to fight off the intruder—then the light shifts, or the figure does, and Harry realizes who it is.

“How did you get in?” He demands, and relaxes, at least a little. The Arrow is in his house. It’s a collision he never expected, somehow doesn’t know how to deal with. The Arrow is for back alley and the night, for shadows and adrenaline. Not for Harry’s house. Not when he’s standing right in front of glass Harry had kissed Zayn against a few days ago, when he’d come over for dinner. It’s a weird juxtaposition, one Harry’s not sure he likes.

“You shouldn’t have said all that.” The Arrow ignores his question, apparently. Sometimes Harry wonders if he’s an actor, in real life, because he stays against the window, dramatically posed. He always seems to understand the drama. Harry can appreciate that.

“About what?”

“About me.”

Harry hadn’t thought the interview had aired yet, but maybe it had. Maybe the Arrow has sources. He probably does have sources. “It’s true.”

“You shouldn’t associate yourself with me like that.”

“It’s true,” Harry repeats. He doesn’t say that about much. Never felt it about much, that sort of basic belief. Harry doesn’t feel things like that, never has. But he knows this much. “You’ve saved my life. That’s true.”

“That’s not because…” The Arrow shakes his head. It’s the first time he’s moved tonight. “Don’t make me a hero, Harry. I’m not.”

“You are. Or is fighting to save people something else?” If the Arrow won’t move, Harry will. He crosses the room, until he’s within touching distance of the Arrow. “Is saving my life not heroic?”

“I’m just the least bad of the monsters.” Harry’s the same height as the Arrow. He’s not sure he’s ever noticed that before, never got close in a place where the Arrow didn’t have the advantage. Out of his boots, Harry might even be taller. He doesn’t feel larger, not with the Arrow’s presence filling the room—another mark for actor, especially in LA—but he doesn’t have to tilt his head to look at the Arrow. If it was lighter, if the Arrow’s hood was pushed back just a little, he might even be able to see his face. “Don’t make me anything more. Not to yourself, and not to everyone.”

“That doesn’t mean you can’t be a hero.” Harry shakes his head. He really never thought he’d be Mary Jane, or Lois Lane, or whatever the other people like that are. And he’s pretty sure that’s who he is, not Jimmy Olsen. Not when he’s spouting dialogue like this. Maybe he is in a movie. “I don’t know what you call it. But saving my life feels like heroism to me.”

“I don’t think it was saving your life.” The Arrow shifts back now, so he can look out the window instead. “That’s not what it feels like. I don’t know why you’ve been being attacked, but I don’t think it’s to kill you.”

“Well that’s a comfort.” Harry tries for a grin, but the Arrow doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t know if the Arrow can.

And isn’t that a thought, for the first time. That the Arrow might not laugh. That the Arrow, for all his mystery, all his excitement, won’t laugh like Zayn had that morning, when Harry’d tripped over Rhino and Zayn had caught him and laughed a little, teasingly, until Harry had kissed him to shut him up. Harry can’t imagine the Arrow doing that.

“It won’t always be true.” The Arrow turns back to Harry abruptly, and Harry can’t even see his eyes but he knows they’re burning, intense. The Arrow might not laugh, but he does this, gives this to Harry, this feeling like he’s all on fire. “If you keep saying things like that, people will think they can get to me through you. The real monsters.”

“It’s true, though.”

“That doesn’t mean you have to say it.”

“Someone has to.” Harry doesn’t expect himself to say that, either. That’s not him. He’s never been the one to say what no one else will. He’ll support it, but he doesn’t say that. Not in interviews, not in public. He doesn’t want to give that much of himself. He’s not Zayn, who always believed, who always had so much in him, so much he had to say. So many causes he would go to the mat for.

“That someone shouldn’t be you.” The Arrow’s hand is on his face, suddenly, cupping his chin just like Zayn does sometimes, and the leather is rough against his skin. It makes Harry shiver despite himself, but it’s not—it’s not right. That’s how Zayn touches him. “I don’t want you hurt because of me.”

“Then you’ll have to make sure I don’t.” The Arrow’s thumb moves over Harry’s cheek. It’s not quite gentle, but it’s almost tender. “You won’t be able to tell me what not to say. No one’s managed that yet.”

“Then be smart. Don’t paint a target on yourself.”

“I’ll say what I want.” Harry lifts his head to look right at the Arrow, but the Arrow’s head is turned, too shadowed. Maybe he wouldn’t feel so weird about this if the Arrow didn’t have a few physical similarities to Zayn—his jaw, his shoulders. But Harry has a type, apparently.

“Then want to be careful.” The Arrow drops his hand. “I can’t always be watching.”

Harry grins, impish and charming. “You always have so far.” He pauses, considers the night outside the glass. “Now, I’m tired and going to bed. Do you want me to turn around so you can properly disappear like you usually do?”

The flash of teeth in a smile is obvious, in the Arrow’s face. He can’t see anything else, but he can see the smile. “If you wouldn’t mind.”

Maybe the Arrow does have a sense of humor, Harry amends, and turns to go to bed. Sure enough, when he looks back from his doorway, the Arrow’s gone. He thinks, for the first time, he’s glad of that. He touches his cheek, where the Arrow’s hand had been, where Zayn’s had. He doesn’t regret what he said. But he doesn’t think he’ll sleep easily, tonight.

\---

“I heard you talked to Harry yesterday.”

Zayn ignores Louis. Instead, he looks at the mirror. This is a more important outfit than the hood, even, because he can’t hide behind a mask. He needs to be himself, and that’s harder. So he’s got on jeans and a tank top, one that will show off the tattoo on his shoulder.

“Yeah. He needed to be warned, after that interview.”

“I know.” Louis swings in his chair, watching as Zayn messes with his hair. Not a lot of product, not today—nothing impressive. They’ll probably know who he is, by name if not by sight, but he doesn’t want to look like it. Tonight, he’s not ZAYN, or whatever he was planning to go by five years ago. Today, he’s the Zayn the island made. The Zayn who let loose a Bratva leader because no matter what he’d done before, he would help Zayn then. Who had led that man and so many others against Ivo, and had won. Who had earned the ink on his shoulder. _Predators respect predators._ He grabs his leather jacket to go on over the tank top, one of the old beaten up ones he remembers Caroline forbidding him from wearing when he’d be photographed.

“I could have done it, though,” Louis goes on, and Zayn focuses back on him. “Not the Arrow.”

“Would he listen to you?”

“I don’t think he’s going to listen to you. Either you.” The chair squeaks. “And anyway, we don’t know that’s what’s putting him in danger.”

“Well something is.” Zayn turns so he can look at Louis properly. “Something is happening, and it’s putting you and Freddie and Harry all in danger, and I don’t know what it is.”

“I know that too.” Louis’s on his feet, his eyes narrowing. “You don’t think I don’t remember that there was a kidnapping attempt on my son? I’m just saying, we don’t know why. It probably doesn’t have anything to do with the Arrow.”

“I know.” Zayn shakes his head. He knows that, but there’s something…he feels like he’s missing something. _Coincidences happen. But assuming they don’t won’t kill you._ “But I needed to warn him.” He won’t let Harry get hurt. Not because of him. He won’t lose him too. _It’s all your fault._ “I have to go.”

Louis narrows his eyes, clearly not done with the subject. But instead of pushing on it now, “I could go with you,” he suggests, like he’d suggested the first time Zayn had told him where he had to go.

“You can’t. They won’t let you in.”

“They’re mobsters, Zayn. And you’re just walking in. Without your bow.”

“I’m owed.” Zayn rubs at his shoulder. “They won’t hurt me.”

“You trust them?” Louis asks, incredulous. Zayn presses his lips together.

“Not exactly. But they’ve got honor. They won’t hurt me if I play it right.” Zayn gives himself a final look in the mirror, then an admittedly wistful look at his bow. But he doesn’t trust them that much. “And we don’t have other options.”

“Nadia could figure something out,” Louis protests, but it’s for form’s sake only. They’ve tried all their other avenues, and Zayn refuses to let Louis tell Nadia more. They need to know why Duberman would want a bomb. What he’d planned to do with them. All the hacking in the world won’t make up for the underworld chatter. “You’re at least taking your comms?”

“No.” When Louis opens his mouth, Zayn keeps talking. “They need to trust me. Not think I’m reporting to someone.” Louis’s mouth closes, and he huffs out a breath.

“Fine. But don’t die, okay? I’m not nearly experienced enough to take up your mantle yet.”

“I’m not planning on it.” Zayn informs him, and pulls one last thing out of the trunk—the handgun he’d gotten, months ago. He slides it into the back of his jeans. That, they’ll be expecting. The knife already in his boot as well. “They wouldn’t be able to take me anyway.”

\---

The Bratva in LA are based out of a chopshop. A garage, on the outside, Zayn figures; then there’s the chop shop level, then the Bratva. Anyway, it looks sketchy even if Zayn didn’t know what was going on inside, a plain cement building that’s far bigger than the garage the broken neon sign declares it as should be.

Zayn stops his motorcycle outside, kicks the stand down, and leaves it behind him. He has a feeling that no one would dare steal it here, if the Bratva don’t decide to take it himself. So he ignores it, and walks towards the open garage door. There are six men in there, two burly fighters, one weedy accountant type—the numbers guy—two actual mechanics who handle their tools like they know how to use them on more than cars, and an older man who’s the biggest threat, by how his gaze focuses on Zayn, merciless and coolly interested.

Zayn doesn’t falter as he walks forward. _You have a predator in you after all, pretty boy. They’ve hidden it deep. But you’re a fighter, aren’t you?_ Slade had laughed as he said that, had slapped Zayn’s back and looked at the man he’d killed with something like pride. Zayn thinks of that pride now. He is a predator, and a fighter. He’s been forgetting that sometimes, with Harry. But it’s who he is. Who he needs to be.

The two big men rise to intercept him. Zayn ignores them, looks right at the old man. “Is this any way to treat a comrade?” he asks, and keeps his head high.

“You’re no comrade.” One of the men growls. The old man doesn’t look away.

“Why do you call us comrade?” he asks.

“That is what Anatoly called me, when he made me captain,” Zayn replies. He had. Comrade, he’d said, watching Ivo’s boat sink, taking Slade’s body with it, and then he’d put a tattoo on Zayn’s shoulder, for men who have fought together. “Is this how you greet me?”

“He’s some rich Brit,” the same big man growls, the one with a lion tattooed on his forearm, in an ironically parallel place to Zayn’s tiger. “We should show him what happens to rich kids who wander into the wrong part of town.”

Now Zayn does pay attention to him, meeting his eyes for a long moment. A moment where he lets himself forget what it meant to come back, lets himself forget his family and Rhino and Harry and the bed Harry got him into. Where he lets himself go back to the island, to the predator he’d been there. And he smiles, slow and welcoming, and lets that smile speak for him.

“You have proof?” The old man asks, into the silence. Zayn shrugs off his jacket, turns enough so they can see the tattoo on his shoulder, the mark of the Bratva Captain. Lion tattoo makes another growling sound, but the old man nods.

“Sergei. Alexei. Let him come.”

The two men step aside, and Zayn goes in.

“I am Dmitri,” the old man tells him, getting to his feet. Despite his age, he doesn’t move with any indication of frailty. “Please, sit. I must make some calls.”

“Of course.” Zayn nods politely, then he takes the seat Dmitiri just vacated, sprawling out leisurely, as Dmitiri nods to lion tattoo and takes him into the back with him. The other four men settle back down, still watching him sidelong. Zayn doesn’t give any indication he notices. If there’s one thing his life has taught him, it’s to ignore the people who are looking at him.

“I like your music.”

Zayn turns his gaze to one of the mechanics, a younger man, probably a few years younger than Zayn, with dark hair and a Slavic face.

“Yeah?” He’d assumed he’d be recognized. Like he assumed it wouldn’t matter, and these men wouldn’t spread what they saw, like they know he won’t.

“Not One Direction. That was—” his brow furrows, like he’s trying to find the word in English. “Not for me. But Mind of Mine, I liked. You…it spoke for me.” He taps at his chest. “To me. No, for me.” He smiles, a little sideways. One of his teeth is chipped, but it makes him look younger. “And it meant something, that you were Muslim. That I saw you there. My mother was very pleased. She is Kazahk,” he explains. The other men are looking at him in warning, but he’s still talking. “She cried, when we thought you dead.”

Zayn blinks. He’s—that’s not what he expected, not here. It’s like the girl who told him she changed his life. Music doesn’t do that. Art doesn’t. Not like he can with his bow and his fists. And yet here’s a man sworn to violence, breaking through suspicion to tell him what it meant. Whose mother cried, for Zayn who she’d never met.

“Thank you,” he says, because he can’t think of what else to say. Once he knew, but not anymore.

“Can you sign this?” the man continues. He holds a piece of paper out to Zayn. “For Petyr, please.”

“Yeah, sure.” Zayn scrawls his signature. He’s pretty sure this is the most surreal thing he’s ever done, sat in a Bratva headquarters and signed an autograph.

“Are you working on more music?” Petyr continues. His face has lit up, enthusiastic and bright. It’s out of place in this garage, where Zayn can see at least six guns, but that just makes it more striking. It makes Zayn feel worse, when he answers,

“Uh, not right now.”

“Oh.” Petyr’s head drops, that light receding. He looks old again, older than he should. “I am sorry to hear that. I was looking forward to more music.”

“Maybe someday, yeah?” Zayn can’t help but assure him. He doesn’t know what Petyr’s done, but that disappointment still hits at him. It gets Petyr to smile again, at least.

“I would be pleased! My mother—”

“Petyr.” Dmitri’s voice cuts through the garage. “Back to work.”

“Yes, sir.” Petyr rubs at his neck, and ducks away. Zayn doesn’t straighten, as Dmitri approaches him, lion tattoo hovering disapprovingly behind him.

“Have you made your calls?”

“It is interesting, to have one such as you as a comrade.” Dmitri says slowly, carefully. “But Anatoly spoke highly of you.”

“As I do of him.” Now that it won’t look like scrambling to his feet, Zayn gets up. “He is a good man, Anatoly.”

“A good captain,” Dmitri agrees. “And what would you have, Captain?” Lion tattoo growls again. Zayn ignores him, and fixes as cool a gaze as he can on Dmitri.

“What will payment be?”

Dmitri smiles. Zayn wonders if his smile is half as intimidating as Dmitri’s, which speaks of long years of his law being blood and steel. It’s not quite the look of that man, the scarred man; that man smiled like he had no blood in his veins, and Dmitri smiles like he knows his blood too well.

Either way, that smile is acceptance, acknowledgment of an equal. “Come back with me, Zayn Malik. We must talk.”

\---

“Duberman’s the man who Trump has contracted to build the camps.”

“What?”

Zayn tosses the papers Dmitri gave him onto the table. Plans for the camp, contracts, from what he can see—gotten from somewhere he doesn’t want to know. Like he doesn’t want to think about what he had to do to get them. But that’s the way of the Bratva. Even among comrades, it’s always a trade. Service for service.

“Duberman has the contract to build Trump’s internment camp.” Zayn can see when it clicks with Louis. When he sits up straight, and his eyes narrow like they used to when someone had just presented him with a challenge.

“That can’t be a coincidence.”

“That the person who is going to build a camp to put a group of people Trump doesn’t want in America was also going to be in possession of a bomb?” Zayn turns away to go towards the dummies. He needs to move. He needs to do something. It’s—he doesn’t know what it is still, but it’s not good, and now it’s becoming clear how not good it is. “If it’s a coincidence, it’s one I don’t want.”

“Are you sure about it?” Louis demands. “You got this information from criminals, right? Maybe they’re wrong.”

“They’re not wrong.” Zayn looks down at his hands. They’re scrubbed clean, all the blood gone. It was a good trade, he tells himself. This information for the blood of someone else. He wasn’t even dead, just in custody, and that had been a fine line to walk, and a deal Dmitri hadn’t been happy to take. But it had been enough. And his hands were already dirty, and now they were a little dirtier, and he had information that made him need to punch something. “That’s where the bombs were meant to go.”

“So, what. He wants to blow up the camps? But it’s not even sure anyone will be in them,” Louis points out. Zayn lets out a breath. He’s already gone through this, the whole way back. Is this the catastrophe Charles had told him about? Or was there something else, as bad? “And it can’t be Duberman, can it? He’s just a contractor. He’s not big enough. Did he even have the contract when the bombs were taken?”

“He’s not,” Zayn agrees. He pivots, goes to the trunk, and pulls out his bow. Louis gives it an askance look, and scoots his chair back. He’s afraid. Louis’s afraid of him. _Anger leads to mistakes_. “We need to wait.”

“Wait?” Louis demands. “Wait? Someone is trying to blow people up, Zayn. We can’t wait!”

“We need to wait, because we don’t know anything.” Zayn takes a breath, draws his bow, and lets the arrow fly. It hits the dummy’s eye. “Maybe it is a coincidence.”

“Maybe it’s not.”

“Maybe it is.” Zayn shoots again. The hamstring. He breathes in, out. Focus. Acting in rage only leads to mistakes. Slade taught him that, in the hardest way, the way that ended with Zayn’s arrow in his eye. “We don’t know anything, Louis. We know Duberman was supposed to end up with the bombs. We know that he’s building the camps. But what else do we know? The camps probably won’t even go through.”

When Louis’s silent for a second, Zayn turns. Louis’s giving him an odd look, a slight smile on his face. “What?”

“I forgot how optimistic you are.”

“I’m not optimistic.”

“You are.” Louis still has that smile on. “You believe in people. That they can’t do shit like vote Trump into the White House, or vote interment through.” He shakes his head. “I’m more cynical than that.”

“I’m cynical.”

“You aren’t. It’s cute.” Louis gets up, and walks to Zayn. He was afraid, and he’s walking to Zayn. It doesn’t compute. He walks to Zayn, and ruffles his hair. Zayn can only stare. No one’s done that for…ages. Slade was his friend, but not like that. Their friendship was different. “You always expect the best from people. And that means you’re always disappointed in them.”

Zayn shrugs, and drops the point of his bow. “I don’t expect much of people.”

“You really do, Zed.” Louis gives a laugh that doesn’t sound very happy. “Not on the face of it, you pretend you believe the worst, but underneath that…Like, when you left—you just expected me to understand. To take the high road. And I didn’t, because that was too much to expect of me.” He shrugs, and then wraps his arms around Zayn, hooking his chin over Zayn’s shoulder, so the bow bumps into his thigh. “It’s not a bad thing, Zed. It’s what makes you—this. What makes you think people are worth saving. And you do it to yourself even more, so it’s not unbearable. But it gives you blinders.”

“I—”

Louis’s apparently not done. He squeezes around Zayn’s waist, tight. “And that’s what I’m here for. To see around those. And to tell you we don’t know what will happen with the camps, and we can’t count on anything.”

“Well what can we do?” Zayn demands. Louis’s arms feel like they’ve paralyzed him. Not like Harry’s do, when he feels caught in them, lost in them, but like Zayn’s forgotten what to do with this, with Louis’s easy affection, with his treating Zayn’s body as his. He doesn’t need to move away. But he doesn’t remember how to respond. Doesn’t know if his limbs know how, after too much blood, too much death. “All we have is links. We don’t have anything concrete.”

“Okay then. What was it you said?” Zayn can feel Louis’s smile in his side, the fierce cool one, the one he’d had pushing the arrow into the man’s back. “We hunt.”

\---

_The island is quiet. As quiet as the island ever gets, animals still moving in the trees, the whisper on leaves. Zayn’s clumsy on it, loud—he’ll get better, until the island is the back of his hand, until he knows the way around it like he once knew his way around a stage. But now he’s clumsy, young. He doesn’t even know where he’s going. He’s just going. Behind him is Slade, Slade and his derisive laughter, but he doesn’t know where he’s going._

_In between the trees, there’s a wisp of a figure. Is that where he’s going? The figure turns, and it’s Shado’s face, her solemn eyes. Zayn reaches out—and then there’s blood pouring down her throat, and she’s gone._

_There’s someone behind him. Zayn turns. It’s another wisp—Fyers, manic grin. Zayn goes to draw his bow, to fight—but then there’s an arrow in his throat and he’s gone._

_Another, to his side—Ivo. Ivo, and his icy gaze, his cool voice. Where’s Zayn’s bow he needs to—but then Ivo’s shaking, dying of his own poison, and he’s gone._

_Zayn looks down at his hands. They’re covered in blood._

_Again, and again. Bodies and arrows and knives and Zayn runs forward, trying to go somewhere, to go. He needs to go, to get away, to leave them—_

_Then a body hits his, and it’s not a wisp it’s a man, and Zayn’s what he was when this first started, clumsy, all his knowledge and weaponry gone, and it’s just Zayn, Zayn and the sudden sure desire he has to survive, and he fights. Fists and flailing and the other man has a knife and—_

“Zayn.”

_and knows his name, but it doesn’t matter, Zayn needs to fight can’t die he needs to live needs to get home needs to survive. He lashes out, and then he’s on the other man, on pure instinct, and the knife is in Zayn’s hand now, and—_

“Zayn!”

_and he was going to be killed and he needs to live, so Zayn takes the knife, and it’s at the man’s throat—and the man is Slade, and he’s smiling, proud, proud like Zayn had made him once._

_“Looks like you’ve got it in you after all,” Slade says, and then there’s blood in his eye and on his face and on Zayn’s hands and Zayn—_

“Zayn!” the voice comes again, and it’s not in the dream. It’s not Slade, it’s not the island, and Zayn jolts awake, his arms up and ready for the attack. “Zayn, you’re dreaming, it’s just a dream.”

It takes him a second to focus. The bed’s soft. The bed is soft. The sun is just rising. His hands are dry, no blood on them. There’s the low hum of air conditioning. Harry’s staring at him, from a bit away on the bed. Harry.

“Fuck,” Zayn swears, and lets his arms drop. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. He hadn’t had a nightmare in days, and now, with Harry here—fuck. “Fuck, Harry, are you—did I hurt you?” He reaches out, then draws back, thinking better of it. Harry won’t want him anywhere near him. Not now. Not now that Harry saw.

“Am I—” Harry lets out a choked laugh. His eyes are wide. Zayn probably terrified him. Zayn should have terrified him. “Are you okay?”

“Did I hurt you?” Zayn demands. He knew this was a bad idea, he should never have slept in the same bed as anyone, stupid—

“No. No, Zayn. I’m fine.” Harry holds out his arms, so Zayn can see all of his bare skin. Bare, smooth skin, soft and flushed with sleep. “You didn’t hurt me.”

“ Alhumdulillah,” Zayn breathes. At least there’s that. “I can—I’ll leave, and you can go, and we don’t—I won’t, like, I don’t have to see—” He can still see the blood on his hands, can still feel it, and if he didn’t hurt Harry it was a close call. Harry heard the nightmare at least, saw that. “You don’t have to see, I mean. Me. I’ll leave you—”

“Zayn.” Harry’s brow is furrowed, and he’s crawling back towards Zayn. Towards Zayn. He should be running away, should be afraid. Not coming towards Zayn, so beautiful with his big eyes and his hair falling around his face. “Zayn, why am I leaving?”

“Because—you saw…” Saw how broken Zayn is. Saw the nightmares, saw the scars. “I could have hurt you, if you’d woken me up wrong. Even if the nightmare had gone differently.”

“Do you think I didn’t research how to wake up someone with PTSD?” Harry shakes his head, and his hair tumbles, as Harry draws himself back to sitting next to Zayn. If Zayn reached out, he could touch him. He won’t, of course, because he’s not that stupid, won’t do that to Harry, but he could. He should move away. Should get Harry out of harm’s way. “I know what to do.”

“Research?” Zayn doesn’t get it. Harry hadn’t known. Hadn’t known how bad it was.

“I’m not stupid, Zayn.” Harry’s hand trails down Zayn’s face, his cheek, feather light. Zayn can only stare at him. Why is he touching Zayn? Why isn’t he running? Doesn’t he know that Zayn will hurt him? “I knew what I was getting into, when I asked you to stay.”

“I’ll hurt you.” There’s no harm saying it, now that Harry knows. Now that it almost happened. He needs Harry to know. His hands are still bloody, from the Bratva mission. He needs Harry to know. “I’m—I’m broken, Harry. You have to know that. I’m broken, and you should go before I break you.” _Shado is dead because of you_.

“You won’t.”

“I’m—I’m not the person you think I am. I’m not who I was.” Harry has to know. He has to know that, and Zayn’s still frantic from the nightmare. He has to know that Zayn’s not the boy whose plane crashed. “I—” He needs to show, he doesn’t know the words. He reaches down, strips off his shirt. Lets Harry see all the ugliness there, the scars that marred what was once smooth skin. All the things Zayn’s done, that he’s kept hidden from Harry.

For a second, Harry just looks, his gaze skimming over Zayn’s torso. It must be clear, in the new morning light, the raised marks, some white some red some darker, messily stitched together or simply bandaged. Nothing nice and neat about these scars. Just pain, and Harry should be able to see that. Should see that and leave. Leave, before he’s another scar on Zayn’s skin, before Zayn makes him ugly too.

Harry looks, and Zayn waits. Then, slowly, Harry leans down, and presses his lips to the graze on Zayn’s ribs, above the gun.

“I know,” he says, his voice low and intimate. Harry’s always been able to do that, to create a room for them just with his voice. “I know you aren’t who you were, Zayn.” His lips move to the circular mark on Zayn’s chest, this one a dark red, angry. “Did you think you were hiding that from me?”

“I—” Harry’s hair is brushing against his skin, almost hypnotic, and Harry’s hands are rubbing gently at his hips, slow soft circles.

“I knew you had scars, Zayn. Keeping a shirt on didn’t hide that.” His lips trace the one on the inside of Zayn’s ribcage, where a knife had sliced and only not dug into his heart because Slade had tackled the man away. “I don’t care.”

“You—”

“No,” Harry corrects, before Zayn can get a word in. “I do care. I care about each and every one.” Zayn can feel himself trembling. He doesn’t know when he’s last felt like this, this open, this vulnerable, as when Harry is over him, exploring all the ugliness on him. “I love each and every one.”

“They’re—”

“Beautiful.” Harry’s moving down Zayn’s body now, finding the whip marks that have trailed from Zayn’s back to his sides, the place where Ivo had tried to gut him. “Beautiful.”

“They’re ugly,” Zayn corrects. “They’re—the places I’m not fixed. I’m marked.”

“I don’t care. They’re beautiful.” Harry looks up, from where he was drawing a line over the gash on Zayn’s hips, the one that starts right at the heart. Hot and intense, like Harry gets, rarely but strongly, like he means nothing more than the words he’s going to say. “They mean you came home.” He ducks his head, but the next words are still clear, and Harry’s good enough with his voice that he must mean them to be. “That you came back to me.”

Zayn’s breath catches, or maybe he hasn’t breathed for ages, or maybe—he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know what’s happening, doesn’t know how Harry’s already brought him so low with just his lips and a gentle touch, but he’s shaking.

“It’s okay.” Harry moves back up him, kisses his lips this time, long and slow, comforting. “It’s okay, Zayn. I’ve got you.” They’re moving against each other, and Zayn doesn’t know when it started, but it’s all flowing into each other, and he’s gone, lost, because he’s broken and Harry’s still here.

“I don’t…”

“I got you,” Harry repeats, and then he’s getting something from the bedside table, then moving back down Zayn’s body, but this time instead of lingering on his scars he just eases down Zayn’s boxers, wraps his mouth around Zayn. Harry’s always liked to tease, but this doesn’t feel like teasing, just—savoring. Care, like he said. No one’s taken care of Zayn in years. He couldn’t let anyone. No one could see, because predators don’t respect weakness and he has to be a predator but Harry’s not, and Harry’s seen his weakness and is still here, still with him.

Harry eases Zayn’s legs farther apart, his mouth still on Zayn, then there’s a finger at his entrance, cool with lube. It’s been years since Zayn’s done this, but Harry seems to know, going so slowly, so slowly Zayn’s shaking, with need or fear or just emotion he can’t tell, all the emotion he can’t show, can’t let himself.

Harry kisses him again, and Zayn makes a noise he doesn’t know into Harry’s mouth. He can still feel the blood on his hands and all his scars are just there, for Harry to see, all the places he’s not the boy he was, and Harry’s still here and he feels stripped open, from the nightmare and Harry’s hands, open and needy.

“It’s okay,” Harry murmurs again, like he’d used to ask Zayn if he was okay, like he’d used to tell Zayn late at night when the world was too much for them both. “It’s okay, I’ve got you. You’re okay. I’m here.”

He’s pressing into Zayn, stretching him and filling him and Zayn’s whole body is Harry, his whole world is, nothing else matters, not who he is or what he is, just Harry and his arms around Zayn, how he’s kissing his cheeks and his jaw and his lips, soothing and gentle. It’s been so long since Zayn’s had gentle. Since someone saw his scars.

It’s slow, so slow and careful and Harry keeps murmuring to Zayn as he moves in him, his arms around Zayn and his lips hardly leaving Zayn for a moment, and Zayn’s clinging, clinging to Harry, who’s just so good, so good and if he can be here for Zayn Zayn can be good too, can hold on to that, as heat rises in him, in his limbs and his head and his core, and Harry’s hand is on him and his hands shouldn’t shake they never shake with a bow in them but Harry’s more than that, and his orgasm washes over him like the slow tide, bringing him up before he even saw it coming.

Harry fucks him through it, and then his voice breaks in the middle of a “Zayn,” and he’s coming too, as Zayn crests up and over.

Harry strokes his hair as they come down, his hands soft on Zayn, his mouth gentle, until Zayn stops shaking. It’s only then that he pulls out, still so gentle, like Zayn will break.

“Haz…” Zayn’s not sure what he’s saying, but Harry shakes his head, nuzzles into Zayn’s neck to kiss him, before he lifts himself up onto one elbow so he can look down at Zayn.

“I don’t care that you have scars,” he says, serious. Sunlight is streaking his face; he looks like something that should be immortalized. That should be put in song and art and everything else. “I care that you came home.”

Zayn doesn’t have words for that. Louis had said he expects the best of people, but he never expected this, that Harry would see his scars and not run scared. He hasn’t seen all of them, doesn’t know what Zayn’s done, but it’s—it’s more. It’s hope.

He kisses Harry with dawn around them, and he’s not sure when he stops kissing him and falls into a dreamless sleep.

\---

For once, Harry wakes before Zayn. He’s not surprised, after Zayn’s nightmare, but it’s still a first, an opportunity, to be able to look down at Zayn’s sleeping face. In the throes of his nightmare he’d looked ancient, like he was in bone-deep pain. But now, Zayn’s relaxed, his eyelashes soft on his cheeks, like the boy he was.

Harry brushes a kiss to his forehead, pushes his hair out of his eyes, then gets out of bed. He pads downstairs to the kitchen. He thinks Zayn deserves breakfast in bed, after last night. And maybe Harry needs some time to himself after last night, that won’t be him running away.

He’s not running away. It’s not the scars that make him need space to think, not the way Zayn had cried out in his sleep, how he’d awoken ready to fight. Harry had been expecting that. He’d known that could come. But he hadn’t expected Zayn’s huge eyes, as Harry kissed his scars; how he’d shaken in Harry’s arms, like Harry had all the power over him. How he’d given himself to Harry, let Harry take care of him—and more than that, Harry thinks, getting out some vegetables to chop into an omelet, how Harry had wanted to take care of him. How he’d wanted to ignore how Zayn was stronger than him now, how Zayn had always been the one to save him, and take care of Zayn instead, to chase the fear from his eyes. He’d wanted that with the sort of need he’d never felt before, never thought he could. More than when he’d urged Zayn out of the house, or back into a bed. It wasn’t about wanting Zayn back, to be better. It was just about wanting to give Zayn whatever he needed. Wanted that like Glenne had held Jeff, after he’d been attacked.

Rhino bumps his nose against Harry’s leg, and Harry smiles, pets his head. It all feels so domestic, like this. Making breakfast in the morning, Zayn asleep upstairs. He’d dreamed of this, when they were kids. It had been a safe dream then. The sort of dream you never thought you’d get, so it never became real. Now it’s real, or something like it. Zayn’s not the Zayn he imagined then, and he knows it, but—it’s real. And he…wants it. He’s okay with it.

There’s a thought, just a thought, for the Arrow, his hand on Harry’s face, how he burns and sends that burn through Harry, the excitement of standing in the dark with him, flirting with danger. But holding Zayn, making him breakfast…that’s a different thrill. One he thinks he might be able to do.

He’s cracking the eggs when he hears movement upstairs. Okay, so not breakfast in bed, just breakfast. That works too. He hears movement on the stairs, but then there’s no Zayn, coming into the kitchen with a sleepy smile. Maybe he’s out by the pool, doing his laps. He has to know Harry’s here; he wasn’t making an effort to be quiet.

Harry finishes the omelets, plates them, then goes to find Zayn. He’s not by the pool, and Harry’s trying to figure out where he could be when he hears a sound he hasn’t heard in years.

He follows the sound of spray paints to the graffiti room, then just leans against the doorframe, smiling helplessly. It’s a sight he’s seen so many times before, Zayn just in sweats, a spray can in hand. It’s different now, of course—Zayn’s back isn’t just the fern and bird at his back, there are faint white marks, from what Harry’s trying not to think could be a whip. Zayn himself is broader, holds himself differently. And what he’s working on is different too, a face—a woman, Asian looking, with big serious eyes and a red border.

He doesn’t realize he made a sound, but he must have, because Zayn turns. He’s still so strikingly, devastatingly beautiful, even with the scars over his torso—and now, in the light of day, it’s easier to see them, and some of them are terrifying, not in how they look, but in where they are, how close they are to vital organs.

“They’re worse, when you can see them.” Zayn’s voice is matter of fact. When Harry drags his eyes back up to his face, his look is just as even, but his eyes are big and liquid, open. Zayn’s never been able to keep his heart out of his eyes.

“I meant what I said.” Harry walks forward, until he can trace his hand up the almost lightning shaped scar on his ribs. “I’m not running.” Zayn opens his mouth to say something, but Harry doesn’t let him. Nothing Zayn says is going to be useful. “You’re painting again?” he nods to the wall.

Zayn shrugs. “Woke up, felt like it.”

“That’s great.” Harry doesn’t try to hide his grin. Zayn is creating again. He’s getting better. “What is it?”

Zayn glances over his shoulder, and something shifts, closing off just a little. “She’s…the person. I told you about. On the island.”

“Oh.” Harry steals a look at her. Jealousy is stupid. She died. He doesn’t—he’s glad Zayn had someone. He can make himself be glad. “She’s beautiful.”

“She was.” Zayn gives her another glance, then takes a deep breath, one Harry can feel against the hand still on his chest. “Her name was Shado.”

“Shado,” Harry echoes, trying the name out in his mouth. It sounds awkward.

“She…she helped me survive.” Zayn shakes his head, and Harry can feel him vibrating again, like he’s going to bolt. Harry slides his hands down to Zayn’s hips, to keep him here. To hold on.

Zayn swallows, and keeps going. “She died.”

“You told me.” He doesn’t need to do this, not if he doesn’t want to.

“She died,” Zayn repeats. His voice is hoarse. “And…and it was my fault.”

Harry can’t help how his hands tighten. “Your fault?”

“I—there was a man, he—he was threatening us. He had a knife at both our throats. He said it would be me or her. I was going to say me!” Zayn’s voice is coming out fast, his breath short, and Harry can just—he can’t even imagine, what it might mean, what it was like, can just hold onto Zayn. “I was going to say me, but he killed her anyway.” He looks down, away from Harry. “I was going to say me,” he repeats. Like he’s trying to convince someone.

Then he looks up again. “I—you have to get it, Harry. I’m dangerous. People I care about die. I don’t want you to be one of them.”

I’m not safe, the Arrow had said. Everyone seems to be telling Harry that. And Harry cares even less now, with Zayn in his arms looking at him like he’s the only thing that matters in the world.

“That wasn’t your fault.” Harry’s hands move to Zayn’s face, so he can force him to stay looking at him. “If you were going to say you, it wasn’t your fault.”

“It was. You don’t know—it was, Harry. I should have been faster, should have convinced him she was more important, I just—I couldn’t—”

“Good.” It comes out of Harry unbidden, but when Zayn’s brow furrows in confusion, Harry nods to himself.

“What?”

“Good,” Harry says again. “I don’t know what to say about her, I’m sorry, but—if it was you or her, I’m not sorry it was her. I’m not sorry you’re still alive, you came back.” He lets his arms slide back, so they can wrap around Zayn’s neck. Zayn’s still staring up at him, all confusion and something like pleading, like he needs Harry to make sense. “You can carry the guilt for that choice,” Harry tells him, pressing forward against him. Shado is watching them over Zayn’s shoulder; Harry thinks a silent apology, but he’s not lying. He didn’t know her. He can’t be sad Zayn is here. “I’m thanking God you didn’t get to make it.”

He cuts Zayn off with a kiss before he can say anything else, trying to show him what he can’t tell him—that he gets it, that he knows this won’t be easy, that he knows Zayn is messed up and has scars deeper than his skin, and he doesn’t care. He wants this. For once in his life, he knows what he wants more than anything.

\---

_It’s a busy office, messy with that, the desk covered in papers. On the walls, there are pictures of a middle aged man with the build of an athlete who still stays in shape—with a pretty brunette wife and two children, in front of a hotel, with Donald Trump. There’s a college pennant on the wall, declaring UTex the best school. The windows look out onto a nicely manicured lawn and a parking lot._

_That same man sits on a chair at the desk, his feet on the desk. His suit pants are just a little too small for him._

_“Yeah, Maude, got it,” he says into the phone. “It’s on track, I told you.” He waits, looks outside as the person on the other end talks. It’s getting late, everyone else long gone home, the bright flash of headlights on the road outside only occasional now. The price of power, he supposes. The price of doing what he has to. “I know the first try didn’t work, but we had contingencies for a reason. There—yeah. Yeah. Okay.” He rolls his eyes at the wall. “This all depends on you getting things to work, you know. I can’t do anything—”_

_Light sweeps over the room from a passing headlight, a slow scan that starts in one corner, then on to the other, illuminating all the corners. Duberman follows the line of it—then pauses, at the figure in the corner._

_“I’ll call you back,” he interrupts the person on the other end of the phone. “I’ve got a visitor. Yeah, it’s him. Let me know about the—yeah.”_

_He hangs up. The Arrow’s bow is drawn, pointed at his throat, not quivering. Neither is Duberman._

_“Corey Duberman,” The Arrow says, his voice filling the room. “Do you have a confession?”_

_“No,” Duberman replies, casual. His hands are clear on his lap, but his feet don’t move from the table. “I don’t.”_

_The Arrow hesitates a breath, barely a second, then, “The bombs. They were meant for you?”_

_“I was supposed to hold them, yes.” Duberman agrees easily. The Arrow’s bow twitches. “Meant for me is a strong term. I’d say more, meant for the terrorist scum.”_

_The bowstring twangs; an arrow appears in the chair next to him. Duberman still doesn’t flinch. “You were planning to set them off in the camps?”_

_“Yes,” Duberman confirms. “Once all those Muslims get gathered up, of course, that’s taking longer than it should.”_

_“Why?” The Arrow’s voice is fast and fierce. “They would be innocent!”_

_“Not all of them.” Duberman sits up, his feet slamming into the floor. “Not most of them. They’re the reason for the terrorists, and then they come here and expect us to take care of them? To pay for them? To tolerate their dirty habits and murdering religion?” His fist smacks into the table. “I won’t have them taking over America.”_

_“And the children?”_

_“They’d just grow up into terrorists anyway.” Duberman hisses. His eyes are alight, fanatical. “I’m doing the world a favor.”_

_“You won’t.” The Arrow’s bow is trained on his throat again, and Duberman tips his head up, as if giving a better angle._

_“What are you going to do, boy?” He narrows his eyes. “You are a boy, aren’t you? A bleeding heart liberal millennial, who thinks those of us who worked for our money should take care of everyone else. What are you going to do? I’m an upstanding citizen. The police chief and I golf. You’re a vigilante. Even if you recorded this conversation, which I doubt, would anyone trust the word of a boy who won’t show his face?”_

_“I could kill you.”_

_Duberman laughs. “You won’t.” He smiles, mocking. “I’ve heard about you. You don’t have the guts.”_

_The Arrow’s hand twists on the bow, and Duberman stares him down, looking for the eyes beyond the hood._

_Finally, the Arrow speaks again. “You’d be surprised what I have the guts for.”_

_Duberman opens his mouth to reply—then an arrow flies, and he flinches. The arrow draws a single drop of blood from his ear. Another arrow, and the room is suddenly blindingly bright. When it clears, the Arrow is gone._

_Duberman takes a deep breath, then picks up his phone._

_“Hello, Maude? It’s Duberman. He doesn’t know anything.”_


	9. Chapter 8

“Were you going to kill him?”

Zayn tightens his grip on the bow, and leans against the alley wall. Deep breaths. _If there is time to think, there is time not to kill._

“I didn’t.” That’s what matters. He hadn’t. His hand had been on the bow, he’d had the shot—and he hadn’t taken it.

“But you thought about it,” Louis says in his ear. It’s not a question.

“Yes.” Zayn’s response is tight. “You heard how he talked. He would have deserved it.”

“And you can kill people for that? For deserving it?”

“I’ve killed people for less,” Zayn snaps. He takes another deep breath. His bow hand can’t shake. He can’t hesitate.

“Zayn…”

“Do you want to hear what I had to do to survive, or do you want to talk about what to do next?” Zayn demands. He doesn’t want to talk about how close he had been to taking that shot. How if Louis hadn’t been in his ear, he might have anyway. He’d have deserved it. “He confessed. He was going to kill us. Kill all of us.”

“I know. But he’s right, Zed. The police won’t trust you.”

“Maybe I should have killed him.” That might have solved the problem. At leastthe immediate one.

“What would that have done? It didn’t sound like he’s in charge of all this.” Louis’s talking fast, like if he doesn’t convince Zayn of this now he’s going to go back and put an arrow in Duberman’s smug throat. “We’ll get them.”

“We will,” Zayn agrees. Another deep breath. “I need to patrol. Is there anything I can hit?”

“Um…break in at a grocery, near you. I’ll give you the coordinates.” Louis takes a breath, then adds, “And Zayn—he doesn’t have the bombs, and the camps are barely being planned. We’ve got some time.”

“That doesn’t help if we don’t know who to target,” Zayn retorts, and breaks into a jog to get to his bike. Maybe he can save someone. Maybe it’ll be enough, until he can figure this out—until he can figure out how to save everyone.

\---

“This one?” Harry runs his finger over the gash on Zayn’s stomach. It looks angry—Harry’s no expert, but he’s pretty sure it didn’t heal like it should.

“Sword. Um. I was…trying to liberate someone, and the guards disagreed.” Zayn talks slowly. He always does, when Harry asks about his stories, like he’s censoring. Harry doesn’t blame him. The bits and pieces Harry gets are worse than anything he could have imagined—worse than the sheer isolation Harry’d imagined. He’d never though about villains and mercenaries and constant battling, or about the price Zayn might have paid to come back to him.

Harry traces it one more time, then moves on. He thinks it helps Zayn to talk, when he will—times like this, in bed with the bright sun sneaking through the curtains because Harry’d only managed to come over this morning. But he doesn’t want Zayn to dwell. He’s been on edge lately anyway, in a way that Harry doesn’t think is about him, but that Harry wants to soothe. He’s always been good at soothing Zayn.

“And—is this recent?” he moves to Zayn’s other ribs, where the skin has turned purple, tinged with green. That’s a bruise. Bruises don’t last this long.

Zayn shrugs. “I’ve, like. The boxing. It helps.”

“You’re being careful,” Harry asks. Or maybe it’s more an order.

“As careful as I can.” Zayn shakes his head, and then he’s moving, so he’s getting out of bed. Harry flops back down, watches his back as Zayn pulls on a pair of sweatpants. It’s a pretty sight.

“This feels like old times,” Harry says, mainly to fill the quiet that seems to have gotten into Zayn’s head. Zayn’s always been quiet, but Harry’s gotten better at reading his different silences—when he’s getting too deep, when he needs to be brought back to the here and now, and when he’s just being quiet and wants to be quiet together.

“I was never awake when you left.”

“I was awake if you did, though.” Harry gets out of bed too. He doesn’t bother putting on clothes, just goes over to drape himself over Zayn. He likes this feeling, the one he’d never gotten before. Because he can, he bites at Zayn’s ear. Zayn swats at his head, brushing against his hair, and Harry replies by nuzzling into Zayn’s neck. He doesn’t smell like smoke anymore, not like he used to, and not like the cologne he’d used, but it’s still—it’s still so good. And even better is that Zayn’s relaxed still, not tense like he’s about to lash out, despite the contact. He’s had more nightmares, but at least awake, Harry hasn’t seen him have flashbacks for a week at least.

“What are you up to today?” Zayn asks.

“Staying in bed with you?”

“Haz.”

Harry laughs, though he wishes he weren’t kidding. “Songwriting for a while. Then some interviews for the movie.”

“Right, I forget you’re a movie star now.”

“Not a movie star. Just an actor.” He lengthens the o in ‘actor’, and gets a smile from Zayn. “I’m multi-faceted, Zayn. I am the rarest diamond.”

“I know.” Harry bites his lip so he doesn’t say something stupid in response to that. If Zayn’s lost some of his humor, gotten more serious, it’s like these bits of him only got stronger—the ones that said stuff like that. That meant it.

“Then, I was thinking…dinner? With Jeff and Glenne? And, um. You?” So maybe Harry did say something stupid. But he’s been thinking about this, about getting Zayn to talk to people who aren’t him or Louis. And more, about Zayn talking to his friends. “Only if you want.”

“I…” Zayn bites his lip as he trails off. Harry lets go of his back so he can turn Zayn around, look him in the eyes.

“Only if you want to,” Harry repeats. “I’d love for you to come, but no pressure if you’re not up for it.” He strokes his thumb over Zayn’s cheek, just to savor it, so he can feel Zayn’s small smile.

“I’ll see? Let me know when I need to decide by.”

“Sure.” Harry pulls him in for a quick kiss. “I’ve got to get home before rehearsal. I’ll text you.”

“Okay.” Harry leans in for a small peck, a good-bye kiss, but then Zayn’s hand is on his neck keeping him there, and Harry can’t help but sink into it, into the fire of Zayn’s kiss. He always kisses like this, like if he stops he won’t be able to breathe, and it’s addicting. Addicting enough that when Zayn finally lets him go, Harry gives him his best smile.

“Sure I can’t stay in bed with you all day?”

“I’m not the one who has to go off and be a movie star,” Zayn points out, and Harry pouts, then goes when Zayn laughs at him, swatting his ass as he leaves.

\---

The songwriting is fine. This is the stuff that’s just for him, that’s him playing around with his own stuff, rather than for One Direction—he’s not sure if he’ll use it himself or sell it to someone else, but it’s something he likes to do. He’s never been Zayn, never needed to pour himself out on paper for someone else to hear, needed his music to be heard or else he’d be desperately unhappy, but he likes songwriting. Likes the puzzle of it, the feeling when he knows it’s right. It’s a different sort of enjoyment than he got from acting, or from being on stage, but he likes it.

So he works on the songs for a while, and if it’s a song about finding someone again, about getting something you never thought you could have, well, this is probably not something he’s going to show Louis so no one can make fun of him for it.

Interviews for the movie are different than he’s used to, though. He sort of likes the novelty. It’s a smaller film, more indie, so the press is similarly lowkey. It’s what Harry thinks might have happened if he’d started somewhere else, not on X Factor. And he has the novel experience of, despite being younger, being the experienced one when it comes to press. After ten years of being the baby of the group—because he knows perfectly well he always has been—he has to say, it’s nice.

They answer questions about the film, Harry talks about the differences between performing and acting, Kevin—the actual star—talks about his process, Jen—the director—talks about her vision. Harry mainly stays quiet, unless he’s addressed.

“Harry,” The interviewer says, and Harry focuses, smiling charmingly. “Even when you were in One Direction, there were always rumors about you being approached for films, but you turned them down. And you’ve been in a few films since, but they’ve always been big films. What was it about Never Forget that made you accept this part?”

“Well, to start, I still am in One Direction,” Harry points out, for the thousandth time since their hiatus. “Our album’s out in a few weeks, then we’re on tour!” He gives the camera a thumbs up.

“Harry actually did this film just to get someone to actually buy his album,” Jen jokes.

“Yeah, he does this other thing, is in this band, but no one’s ever heard of them,” Kevin agrees, and the interviewer laughs, as does Harry.

“So, Harry,” the interviewer, a man in skinny jeans and big glasses, focuses on Harry again. “What was it about this film? Did something in the themes speak to you?”

“Kevin was just so pretty, who wouldn’t want to work with him?” Harry teases, as Kevin blushes. Harry’s about seventy-five percent sure Kevin does have some sort of crush on him, but he’s been letting it lie, other than flirting mercilessly because it’s fun.

“Aren’t you his brother, in the film?”

“Details.” Harry waves his hand. “You clearly haven’t seen it, have you?”

“He’s lying, don’t listen to him!” Jen hurries to correct, as Harry smirks. “Any incest is subtext Styles managed to get in.”  And there’s the soundbyte. Harry probably shouldn’t have set that up, but the downside of all this is he doesn’t have people just as relentlessly media trained as him, who won’t fall into those traps. Or usually won’t. Sometimes Louis sees the traps and jumps in because that’s who he is.

“I liked the idea of healing,” Harry inserts. He can save Jen from herself, bring the camera back to him. “So much of the film is about figuring out how to live with trauma, and that did speak to me. I know I haven’t had much trauma, not compared to Jules, Kevin’s character, or many others—” Zayn’s white face, his scars, the nightmares—“But the part about dealing with unexpected tragedy, it resonated.”

“You’re talking about your ex-bandmate Zayn Malik’s plane crash?” the interviewer clarifies, and Harry tugs at his hair.

“Yeah. It was a few years before the talks for this film started, of course, but it was a difficult time, so when I read this script I knew I wanted it.” Harry gives a lopsided smile, because that was more than he’d wanted. “And he always loved superheroes, so that aspect felt like a bit of a tribute.”

“And now that he’s been found again? Does that affect your perception of the film?”

This is where, in an interview with One Direction, Louis would say something outrageous to divert, or Harry would start flirting. But he doesn’t have that, so he chooses his words carefully. He doesn’t want to say more than Zayn wants. “I’d say now it resonates even more. Zayn and I have been hanging out, and seeing him deal with his own experiences…I see even more how important talking about this is.”

“Speaking of resonances—a lot of talk has been made about how the film’s having a little bit of a parallel in real life. Do you think the Arrow copied you?”

Jen laughs. “I think if he has, he’s doing it wrong. Jules’s violence isn’t simple, in the film. He’s not a superhero, no matter what Harry wanted for his friend. He’s not even a hero, he’s a man on a mission that hurts a lot of people. So if the Arrow is using us as an example, he hasn’t watched closely.”

“Harry? The rumor is you’re friends with the Arrow. Does he have a comment about the film?”

“We haven’t talked about it.” And it’s been weird with the Arrow lately, anyway. Since that night in Harry’s house, or maybe since the day after Zayn’s first nightmare. Harry’s always comes away from talking with the Arrow feeling guilty, even though he didn’t do anything, other than maybe a bit of flirting. And the Arrow must sense it, or something, because he’s more distant too. “But I think he’d say that in that way he’s similar to Jules. He’s on a mission too.”

“And he certainly hurts people,” Kevin adds, his lips pressing together disapprovingly. “And there’s the fact that he’s not fiction, which I think is a rather major difference.”

“And it’s much easier to judge the motives of someone who’s fictional,” Harry points out. They’re getting off topic. He doesn’t want them on the topic of the Arrow at all. “While we’re in Jules’s head, we don’t know why the Arrow is doing what he’s doing. That’s not a fair parallel. And anyway, “ Harry continues, before anyone can say anything, “How’s he supposed to have seen the film, anyway? It’s not out yet. Unless it’s one of us…” he gives Kevin an exaggerated sideeye, and everyone’s distracted.

Jeff’s waiting for him when he’s done. He’s only sort of in charge of Harry’s film career, but Harry’s happy to have him around whenever. “Like watching, darling?” Harry teases, once he’s washed off his makeup and said goodbye to Kevin and Jen.

“You’re gonna be a star!” Jeff agrees, in his best New York accent. They head out, towards their cars. “But. You might want to chill, on the Arrow questions.”

“They’re asking me.”

“And you’re answering.” Jeff leans against the door of Harry’s car, his arms crossed. He’s got his big brother look on. Sometimes Harry wonders how it is that despite having been born with no older brothers, he’s somehow acquired so many. “Did you hear that he almost killed Corey Duberman the other day?”

“Who’s Corey Duberman?”

“He’s a real estate person, my dad knows him. Apparently he’s a total asshole. But are you sure this is the thing you want to take a stand on? He hurts people.”

“He saved you,” Harry retorts, folding his own arms over his chest.

“I know. And I’m grateful, and we have interviews for bodyguards going on. But…”

“He’s a good person, Jeff. He’s trying to do good.”

“Harry.” Jeff’s face is serious, concerned. “You don’t even know who he is. How can you be sure?”

“I—” Harry’s phone buzzes, and Harry holds up a hand to Jeff as he checks it. It’s from Zayn.

_I’m good. Where and when?_

Harry can’t help his smile. He knows it’s probably stupid, and it’s so ridiculously sappy and feels like something Liam would do, beam at a phone just because he has a text from someone, but he can’t help it.

“It’s Zayn. When’s Glenne getting there?” he asks, and Jeff lets himself be distracted.

\---

“You’re a bit of a legend, you know.”

Zayn raises his eyebrows. He thinks Jeff is a little drunk, because he’s talking in that hearty, effusive way that some people get when they’re drunk, but maybe Zayn’s just projecting. Dinner has been fine. He’s been okay, he’s just…Jeff and Glenne are nice enough. He’d known Jeff, a bit, before, just from being Harry’s friend, and he’d been fine then, but he feels…Maybe it’s that Zayn’s forgotten, what it’s like to socialize. Or maybe it’s that Zayn spent all day staring at the write up of Duberman he’d gotten from the Bratva and Nadia, going through plans and contracts and rumors, trying to pull together the dots.

Or maybe it’s that he’d had a nightmare last night, one that hadn’t woken Harry but had left him shaking, trying to get the image of Slade out of his head. It hadn’t even been Slade with an arrow in his eye, Slade as Zayn had last seen him—it had been the Slade Zayn had known, had relied on, the one who had been his friend, and the look he’d given Zayn when he’d found Zayn and Shado together. Not betrayal, not quite, just—resignation. Slade had been a good man, once. And Zayn can’t escape that face tonight. The face of a man that is willing to concede, to step out of the race, for the happiness of his friends, and who knows his life will go on but who’s wracked in pain about it. The selfless man.

“Not just the way you left, and all,” Jeff goes on. Harry squeezes at Zayn’s leg, more a question than a prompt. Zayn smiles at the look Harry gives him them, the concern. He’s okay. He thinks. “But how Sarah managed your disappearance. It’s going to become textbook.”

“Jeff.” Glenne puts her hand on his. “I’m sure Zayn doesn’t want to talk about that.”

“Oh, you’re right. Sorry, man.”

Zayn shrugs. “It’s okay. It’s not, like. I’m happy I did so well, even if I couldn’t appreciate it.”

“You were poised to anyway,” Jeff tells him, shaking his glass at Zayn. Zayn watches it, wills himself not to flinch away. It’s emphasis. Zayn’s okay. “The strategy was amazing. Sarah’s great, you’re lucky you got her.”

“And his music might have had something to do with it,” Harry adds. His chair is next to Zayn’s now, close enough his hand can move from Zayn’s knee to his waist. “Maybe.”

“Of course, that. But leaving like you did might have been a dick move, but it was definitely strategic.”

“Jeff!” Glenne snaps. Harry’s hand tenses on Zayn, and Zayn bites his lip, but it’s Harry who speaks.

“Speaking of strategy. What do you think of the Packer’s trading Martin?”

Jeff is sufficiently distracted, and Zayn relaxes. A little, at least. Enough that no one will get pictures of him looking like he’ll bolt, in this fancy restaurant with fancy people. Zayn hadn’t fit in with these people when he was twenty-one and on top of the world. He doesn’t know why Harry would think it would be different now. He’d never fit in with Harry’s friends.

Slade’s face, fuck. Slade’s face, and now it’s Louis’s face too, when Zayn’s leaving was announced. That face he remembers well, all the boys. Somehow, it was the only face of theirs he could remember clearly, on the island. That last view of them, angry and betrayed. Except Slade wasn’t betrayed, and he knew it. Or he did before the mirakuru, before everything had been twisted by the drug and Ivo and Shado, blood on her throat, and Slade bleeding out on that ship, clutching at Zayn like sanity had returned for a moment before _selfish bastard, it’s all your fault, you fail everyone_ —

“We’re going to go outside for a moment, excuse us.” Harry’s nails dig into his side, and Zayn starts, pulls himself back. Fuck. He’d been doing well, been trying. At least he hadn’t attacked anyone. That’s something. But it’s not enough that Harry doesn’t have to get him to his feet, urge him outside.

The air’s fresher out here, as fresh as it gets in LA, and Zayn leans back against the wall, taking a deep breath, as the sounds of the city filter in. Not the island, the city.

“Would have been easier if I still smoked, yeah? That was always a good excuse to escape.”

Harry snorts, which Zayn appreciates. It wasn’t a good attempt at humor. “This was fine. Jeff and Glenne will be fine.”

“I—I was trying.” Zayn stays against the wall, but he turns to look at Harry, who’s leaning there next to him. The street lights gild him, until he’s like an actual icon, instead of just a metaphorical one. The perfect pop star. So much better than Zayn deserves, than he should have. Than he should sully with the blood on his hands. If he weren’t so selfish, he’d push him away. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“I know.” Harry nudges his hip against Zayn. “It’s fine. Do you want to go back in?”

He should. He knows he should. He should go in and make nice with Jeff and Glenne and talk about sports or whatever shit they want. He should, because Harry’s trying too. But he can feel Slade at his edges, sneaking in; feel Shado’s hair under his hands, and he’s not sure if the next time the waiter reaches for his water he won’t react badly. But he’s trying. He needs to try. He can try to be not broken, for Harry. “I can.”

“Not what I asked. Do you want to?”

Zayn lets out a long breath. “I can if you want me to.”

“I want you to do what you want.”

“I think we can get stuck here for a while.”

Harry laughs. “You want to go home? No,” he goes on, before Zayn can answer, “Let me try again. Would it be better for you if you went home?” His hand is on Zayn’s side now, right over one of the whip marks. Harry knows that’s there. He knows Zayn’s broken, even if he doesn’t know everything.

“Yes.” Zayn’s chest feels heavy, admitting it. Or maybe that’s the nightmare. Or Duberman. He doesn’t know anymore. But he doesn’t want to hurt anyone. “Yeah, that’s probably best.”

“I’ll text when I’m done. See if I can distract you.” Harry waggles his eyebrows, and Zayn chuckles despite everything.

“Thanks.”

“Of course.” Harry glances around, but there are plenty of people, and it would break their tacit understanding that this is just for them. Zayn’s not sure why Harry’s doing it, but Zayn can’t risk it. Can’t risk Harry being known as someone he cares about. So he just runs his finger over Zayn’s scar again. “I always like distracting you.”

Zayn should say something flirty back. Something flirty, or leave. But instead, what comes out is, “I didn’t, like. That’s not why I did it.”

“Did what?”

“Leave. Leave the band,” he amends. He has to say this. He’s had this conversation with Louis, but he’s never said it, not to Harry. And Harry needs to know. Harry deserves to know. Zayn’s cruel, and he’s not a good person, but that wasn’t one of the ways he’d done wrong. That had been before, anyway. When his cruelty was mainly accidental. Before he’d been made into this. “It wasn’t, like, Jeff was saying—it wasn’t because of strategy.”

“I know.” Harry looks over at him, and he’s smiling, the little almost shy one that the public doesn’t get. Once, he’d always seemed smaller than he was, hunching over, making himself shorter. He doesn’t do that anymore. “I know, Zayn.”

“It wasn’t—it wasn’t about selling albums.” It feels far away, everything he’d felt then, how trapped, before he knew what it really was to be trapped. It feels like it doesn’t matter, except for how it does. “It was…”

“You needed to say what you had to say,” Harry fills in. His hand’s on Zayn’s face now, rubbing over his cheekbones like Zayn thinks he does when he’s trying to figure out what to say. “You were always the one with the most to say, and the least way of saying it. We all knew that.”

“It didn’t seem like it.”

“It took time to remember.” Harry’s thumb strokes over Zayn’s cheeks once more, then he drops his hand, and he smiles, the big easy smile that he uses when he’s trying to cover something up. “See you later?”

“Yeah.” Zayn pauses. He wants Harry there tonight, but he has to patrol. He has to figure out what will happen, because something’s going to happen even if the bombs are out of play. “I don’t know if I’ll be up for anything tonight. Tomorrow?”

“That’s fine.” Harry’s smile is still in place. “Let me know if things change?”

“Yeah.” Zayn watches Harry go back inside, then turns to go. He should have called for a car, but he’d expected to go back with Harry, or hoped to. And the fresh air is doing him well. He’ll walk for a while.

It’s a bad idea. He definitely needs to patrol, because he can hardly go a few feet before he gets back in his head, before all there is is Slade and Shado and blood. If Slade had just told him what he felt…Zayn’s not sure what he’d have done, but it would have turned out so much better. If Slade had told him, had told Shado. If he’d told Slade. It’s in his head, something heartbreaking and painful, the words they should have said, a song, and—

And someone is following him. Zayn doesn’t adjust his pace, but someone is following him. It’s almost a relief, except for how it makes no sense. If someone knew he was the Arrow, there would be more than one person following him, unless it’s the man with the scar…but Zayn doubts he’d be able to hear him, not like this. So they’re after Zayn. But all of Zayn’s enemies are dead, left on the island like the ghosts they are. Could this be connected to what’s happening with the other boys? That might make more sense.

There’s only one way to find out. _We are small. Play the rabbit, and your attacker will be over confident._

_What she means, pretty boy, is that you look like good bait._

Zayn turns into the closest alley. It’s a shitty place for an ambush; he could get out the other side easily, could even get up the fire escapes to the roof of the nearest building if he had to. There are probably even security cameras on the back door of the business at the far end. But he suspects his follower doesn’t know that.

Sure enough, as soon as Zayn is out of easy view of the main road, his attacker moves. Zayn lets himself be pushed against the wall, a knife held loosely to his throat.

“I have a message for you,” the man says. He’s big, with the muscles and cockiness of someone who’s fought a few times and considers himself an expert. Muscle for hire. “You need to stay away from them.”

“From who?” Zayn knows he isn’t acting scared well, but the guy doesn’t seem to notice.

“That’s not part of the message. You pissed someone off, though. You need to stay away from them. You should have stayed dead. Then they’d be free. That’s what I’m supposed to say to you.”

Zayn shifts, looks into the man’s eyes. The threats were delivered in a low growl, but there’s no conviction behind it. Just hired muscle. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t know more.

“No.”

“What?” His hand on the knife twitches, and then Zayn shoves off the wall. It’s a knee to his stomach and a twist of his arm and then he’s the one against the wall, and Zayn’s hand is steady on the knife to his throat.

“Who hired you?”

“I don’t know.” The man’s breath wheezes out. He’s doing scared well.

Zayn presses his elbow into his back, his windpipe. It should hurt. “Who hired you?”

“I don’t know! It was all email, burner phones, you know!”

Zayn hates the internet sometimes. “Fine then. I have a message for you,” Zayn hisses. It’s time for this to end. “To send back to whoever hired me. You understand?” He waits, but the man doesn’t answer, so Zayn presses with the knife, just enough for him to feel the pressure.

“Yeah! Yeah, man, what do you want?”

“Tell them this ends.” _You’ve got a predator in you after all_. Zayn does. Zayn will not let people he loves be hurt. “Tell them that if anyone I care about gets attacked again, I will find everyone who touched a hair on their head, and I will kill them, slowly. Starting with you.” The knife is just shy of drawing blood now. _Believe your threats. A threat you won’t carry through on means nothing._ “And then I will find your employer, and they will wish I was as merciful with them as I was with you.” He can feel the man shaking against him. “Do you understand?”

“Yes! Yes, I’ll tell them!”

“Good.” Zayn yanks the knife back, pushes the guy away from the wall. “Do it now.”

“Shit, man.” The guy stumbles back a few meters, staring at Zayn with wide eyes. “I thought you were just some spoiled rich kid, but you’re fucking crazy, aren’t you?” He says it with more respect than not.

Zayn watches him dispassionately. “Go.”

He waits as the man scrambles out of the alley, then wipes his prints off the knife, tosses it into a dumpster. It’s not over. _Never trust a threat to end things. Things end when the person behind it is dead._ But maybe this will make them think twice, before they hold a knife to someone else’s throat. To Freddie’s. To Harry’s. Whoever they are. Whatever they want.

Zayn shakes his head, and leaves the alley too. The melody is still in his head.


	10. Chapter 9

_The girl hurries through the dark streets, glancing right and left. It’s late, the moon visible through the smog and streetlights, and the single person occasionally passing by her only serves to make her walk faster. The streetlights illuminate a pretty face, framed by a hijab that could be green or blue or anything in between, right on the cusp of adulthood._

_She passes by a loud bar, the sounds of sports and men cheering coming from inside. Her shoulders relax when she’s past it without incident._

_“Hey, pretty girl.” She tenses again at the call behind her. “Pretty lady!”_

_She keeps walking. Footsteps sound behind her—more than one set. “Why won’t you look at me, pretty girl?”_

_“She’s too good for you, Bob,” another male voice adds, slurring slightly, and she sets her jaw, doesn’t flinch, just keeps walking. “Thinks she’s too good for a hardworking man like you.”_

_“Hey, pajama mama!” Bob calls. “Bet you look super pretty without that ugly thing on your head! Let me liberate you!” The second man chuckles. “I could liberate you real good!”_

_The men’s footsteps are getting closer. She hurries her steps, gathering her jacket around her like a shield. Her hand runs over the phone in her pocket, all its lights gone black._

_“Show us your hair, pretty girl! Let’s see what’s under that stupid hat.”_

_She takes another step, stumbles on a loose bit of cement. Her cry of pain his loud in the night. The men, middle-aged men with faces flushed from alcohol, give each other grins and break into jogs towards her._

_“Yeah, pretty lady, let’s—”_

_“Leave her alone.” The growl thunders out of nowhere and everywhere, and then an arrow strikes the cement in front of her, like drawing a line. She squeaks in surprise, the men reel back, their eyes widening in confusion at the arrow on the ground, then the Arrow standing behind them, the bow pointing at them._

_“We were just complimenting her,” Bob’s friend explains, “Telling her how pretty she is! That’s not a crime!”_

_“Yeah, we want to liberate her,” Bob agrees. He holds out his hands, placating, conspiratorial. Man to man. “Telling her this is America. She doesn’t need to wear one of those hi-hab things. She’d be so much prettier without it.”_

_The Arrow’s hand twists on the bow, but it doesn’t falter. “Leave her alone.”_

_They look at him in confusion a moment longer. “We were! We weren’t hurting her or nothing.”_

_The Arrow moves in a sudden burst, and then his hand is on Bob’s throat, closing around it just enough so he can feel the pressure. “Leave her alone,” he repeats, slowly, then lets go, steps back. Bob stumbles, falling against his friend. “Go home.”_

_“Yeah, man. Spoilsport,” Bob’s friend mutters, pulling Bob back to his feet. “We were just having a bit of fun.”_

_“Go.” Both men mutter under their breaths, but they go, dragging each other back in the direction of the bar. The Arrow watches them go, until they disappear inside, then turns back to the girl._

_“Are you okay?” he offers her a hand, but she jerks away from it._

_“What do you want?” she demands, scrambling to her feet on her own._

_“Nothing.”_

_“Sure. Are you going to tell me take my hijab off too? Is that the price I have to pay for being rescued?”_

_“No.” The Arrow drops his hands, puts his bow back over his back. “Ignore them.”_

_“Easy for you to say.” She tugs on the edges of her hijab, fixing it where it’s fallen out of place. “People like your hood. You’re Batman, right? Some rich white kid who’s taken it upon yourself to help us poor defenseless people. Well, I’m not defenseless, and I don’t need you deigning to help me or tell me to ignore them when you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”_

_The Arrow studies her for a moment—this girl with her flashing eyes, all righteous anger._

_Then he raises a hand to his hood, and pushes it back. Her intake of breath is loud._

_“Subhanallah,” she mutters. “You’re—”_

_“I know what I’m talking about,” the Arrow says, in a voice that isn’t a growl anymore. “And ignore them. You’re bigger than them.”_

_“Yeah. Um. Yeah. Wow.” She looks like a girl again, suddenly stuttering. “Wow. I had the biggest crush on you. This is—you’re—wow.” She shakes her head, like she’s clearing it. “Why’d you tell me?” she demands, sharper again._

_The Arrow shrugs. “You can be bigger than them. Than everyone who says shit like that.”_

_The girl smiles, wry. “Knowing you’re the Arrow doesn’t help with that. Seeing you on TV, that helped.”_

_“Well. Whichever way.” He tugs the hood back up. “And no one will believe you if you tell anyone.”_

_“I won’t.” She etches an X over her heart. “I—thank you.”_

_“Get home safe,” he tells her, and turns to go, fading into the shadows._

_“Fi Amanullah,” she says, into the darkness, then looks around, and hurries in the direction she was going._

_\---_

“Well. That was stupid.” Louis watches as Zayn comes into the basement, setting the kickstand on his bike and pushing back his hood.

“What?”

“Telling that girl.”

Zayn shrugs, and hangs up his bow and quiver, then pulls out his comms. “She won’t tell anyone. And who would believe her even if she did?”

“You’re asking which of One Direction’s fans would believe a crazy theory?” Louis asks, raising his eyebrows, and Zayn has to smile.

“Yeah, but me, a vigilante?”

“There was a website devoted to proving Fred was a doll.”

“Then I just have to hope she keeps her word.” Zayn stops at the sink, leans down to wash the dark coloring off from around his eyes. “I don’t know, Lou. I just did it.”

“And now some random girl knows your secret identity.” Zayn can almost hear Louis shakes his head. “If that somehow puts Freddie in danger…”

“It won’t.” Zayn turns, so he can look at Louis, so he can look him straight in the eye. “Louis. I swear. I wouldn’t do anything to put Freddie in danger.”

“I know.” Louis gets up, pacing like he does, towards the dummies. “I just worry.” He pushes at one, watches as it bounces back. “I can’t protect him like you can.”

“I won’t let anything happen to him.” Zayn unclenches his fist. He’s said that before. He said that about Shado, about Slade, about everyone he’s cared for. And now they’re dead. But he’ll have to do better. He has to. “To any of you.” His fingers, pulling the trigger that left Ivo dead. His arrow, in Fyers throat. Too late on both of them. He can do better. He has to.

“You can’t be everywhere, Zayn.”

“That’s what you have bodyguards for.” Zayn shifts, then starts to strip out of his leathers. “And I don’t think it’s me they’re going after, with the attacks on you. When they attacked me, they told me to stay away from someone.”

“You were attacked?” Louis whirls, marches over to shove at Zayn’s shoulder this time. “Like, you you?”

“Yeah, not in the mask. A few days ago. He said he was delivering a message—”

“And you didn’t tell me?”

“It wasn’t relevant.”

“And you just decided that!” Louis shoves at Zayn again. Zayn lets him. Louis’s anger is easy. He’s used to it. There’s even something comforting about it. About letting Louis push at him, like he used to. “It could have something to do with my son! With the fact that someone is trying to blow up the city!”

“It wasn’t a big deal. I don’t tell you everything I do during the day.”

“This isn’t—” His fist swings, and Zayn’s moving before his mind processes it. He catches the fist, and then it’s behind Louis’s back, locked tight and Zayn’s arm is around his throat.

For a second, they both freeze. Then Zayn swears, and lets Louis go. Fucking hell. He’d been—he hadn’t reacted like that in weeks. He’d been letting Louis hit him just moments ago. He’d been better, and now—

“Louis—”

Louis shakes out his arms, steps away. His face is unreadable. “You okay?”

“Am I okay? Are you okay?” Zayn takes his own step back, holding up his hands. “I’m sorry, I—”

“It’s fine.” Louis rubs at his shoulder, then drops his hands. He doesn’t look any different than he did five minutes ago. “You’re going to have to teach me how to fight soon, though.”

“I’m not.”

“You say that now. But I’ll wear you down. I always do.” Louis smirks. “Now, do you want to hear the latest about how much Trump and his cronies hate you? They were really down on the Duberman attack. I think Maude whatever called you ‘a terrorist plague on the great country of the US, who must be taken down before we can call this great nation safe.’”

“She used great twice?” Zayn stays away from Louis, but he circles over to the computer Louis’d had open.

“No one ever said you had to be smart to be Trump’s right hand. Schwarzenegger had something to say too. Want to hear?” Louis slides into the chair he’d vacated, right next to Zayn. Like he’s not afraid to come close again.

Zayn takes a deep breath. “Yeah. I guess I do.”

\---

“I’m not sure this is a good idea.” Zayn says it, but he also looks so good wet, the water from the shower glistening on his skin, over all the tattoos and scars and muscles, so Harry thinks he’s probably wrong.

“Why?” Harry steps into the shower, closes the door. Zayn’s got a massive shower anyway, because he’s always been into bathroom decadence. Or he was. He probably didn’t have much in the way of rain showers on the island, and he does take short showers now, but when he got the house he was into big, decadent showers. So Harry fits comfortably, as he settles his hands on Zayn’s hips, pulls himself close to Zayn.

Zayn doesn’t resist, lets Harry press against Zayn, all their bare, wet skin touching. The water’s on Harry’s back now, wetting his hair, creating a dizzying contrast of the warmth of Zayn’s skin on his front and the heat of the water on his back. “Because someone’s going to fall and hurt themselves, and I’m betting it’ll be you.”

“You won’t let me fall.” Harry gives his most convincing smile, and moves in to nibble on Zayn’s jaw, stubbled still. “And I’m not giving up a chance to have you wet and naked.”

“Even pool sex seems safer.”

“Are you saying no?” He licks the water off of Zayn’s cheek, gets a laugh from him. It makes Harry pull away from Zayn’s skin just to look at him, because—he looks younger, here. He looks like he was. He looks open, laid out for Harry, wet and naked, all his scars there for Harry, his hair falling into his face and smiling like he had when they were twenty and he’d been eating a candy thong off of Harry for the world to see. Harry strokes over his cheek, pushes his hair out of his eyes. “I could leave.”

Zayn sighs, but he’s still smiling. “No.” He turns them suddenly, so Harry’s pressed against the back of the shower, and Zayn’s hands are scraping down his back. “But we’ll probably be safest if you stay there and don’t move.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Harry grins, and tugs at Zayn so he comes back up to kiss him. There’s something so intoxicating about the slick sound of their skin together, of Zayn’s lips, of the way he kisses, still so intense all the time, even as he smiles into the kiss. Intoxicating and arousing, and it’s not taking more than the kiss for Harry’s dick to get interested.

“The fun is keeping you safe.” Zayn tells him, when Harry’s stopped kissing his lips for his neck, his jaw. Touching Zayn is addictive, all muscle where there might have been bones, not a spare bit of fat on him. It worries Harry a little, how little fat there is, but his muscles are so intriguing, how Harry can feel them shift as he strokes over Zayn’s abs, down to his cock.

Zayn swears when Harry wraps his hand around his dick, strokes. He’s wet already, no need for lube or anything, and his head falls forward, into Harry’s shoulder. “Shit, Haz—”

“Told you this was a good idea.”

“You did,” Zayn admits, his voice shaking as Harry thumbs over the slit. The words are his lips against Harry’s collarbone as much as sound, and Harry can feel it everywhere, Zayn’s lips and the water and the sounds Zayn’s making as Harry strokes him off. He goes slow, teasing himself and Zayn both; there’s nothing quite so good as seeing Zayn turn inarticulate and begging because of Harry. And a part of him that he isn’t proud of likes that he can, that he can give Zayn this that he didn’t have with the girl on the island, the slow and the tender, that he can take his time and make Zayn feel.

He moves his other hand from Zayn’s hair down his back, so he can press at his hole, just dipping in, and Zayn comes with a moan that echoes in the shower, going loose against Harry.

Harry strokes him through it, then keeps going until Zayn groans and bats at his hand, still mouthing at Harry’s skin in a way that’s making Harry squirm, caught between Zayn and the shower wall.

“Told you,” he tells Zayn, when Zayn lifts his head.

Zayn rolls his eyes. “Brat.”

“Just saying!” Harry grins, and gets a hand between them to give himself some relief. He’s still got Zayn’s come on his hand, and the mixture of it and the water is hotter than Harry’d anticipated. He’s had shower sex before, not often because he is usually aware that he’s not coordinated enough for it, but this is different. This is Zayn. This is the thing he’d used to dream about, and the reality of it is so much more. “You should probably reward me.”

“I don’t think it counts if you tell me to do it,” Zayn observes, but then he’s on his knees. The water hits right at the back of his head, and it can’t be comfortable, but it’s gorgeous, Zayn dripping and licking up Harry’s cock. The water brings out every plane of his face, all the hollows, his hair dark against his skin, and it’s the most beautiful thing Harry’s ever seen. Even if he might be biased, because it’s also one of the best things Harry’s ever felt, Zayn’s mouth on him, sucking warm and wet and the rest of him is wet but cooler and it’s overwhelming.

His hands scrabble for purchase, for something, and he finds himself with them on Zayn’s head. It’s only polite to push his hair back, he figures, but then he can’t bring himself to move his hands. He’s always loved Zayn’s hair, and it’s wet and thick and Zayn’s killing him and he looks like something unearthly here, and Harry can’t help his hips jerking into Zayn’s mouth.

He can feel Zayn choke, lets up with his hands—then Zayn’s pulling off of him, and his shoulders are shaking, and that’s not good. Harry can hardly think, he’s so close, but—

“Are you okay?” Harry’s voice is a harsh rasp.

Zayn looks up, which was maybe the wrong thing to do if he wanted Harry to have any higher brain function at all. Not when there’s droplets glistening on Zayn’s eyelashes, when his lips are swollen and pink.

“Yes.” He swallows. Harry should—he shouldn’t take him at face value, he should do something, but—“Yes,” Zayn repeats, and then he’s moving Harry a little and going back down. The water’s not hitting them quite as directly now, but he seems determined to make up for that, the way he goes down on Harry, doing everything Harry likes until Harry’s warning him in half sentences he can only hope Zayn understands.

He must understand, because he drags his mouth off of Harry, wraps his hand around Harry instead, and he’s biting a mark into Harry’s laurel when Harry comes, his hands pounding against the shower wall.

He drags Zayn back up to kiss him, wrapping his arms around Zayn’s waist. He tastes like Harry, which Harry’s always liked.

“You’ve got a dirty mouth,” he teases, licking at Zayn’s lips.

“You’re the one who likes it.” Zayn kisses him back, long and hard. Even just having come, having Zayn pressing against him, all wet and naked, is irresistibly hot. They’re going to need to do this again.

Except…Zayn’s kissing him, and he’s not shaking or anything, but there’s something tense in him still.

“Are you okay?” Harry asks again. It’s easier now he’s come and can think again.

Zayn swallows. “Let’s get dried off before we turn into prunes.”

Harry presses his lips together, but he lets it go. Zayn will tell him when he tells him. Trying to get him to do it sooner will only set him off.

Zayn shuts off the shower, grabs two towels, and tosses one to Harry. Harry manages to catch it, then steps out after him.

“I just want to point out I didn’t get hurt—fuck,” he swears, as he trips over the edge of the shower, and windmills forward. Zayn catches him without a beat, sets him back on his feet.

“You were saying?”

“That I knew you wouldn’t let me fall.” Harry grins distractingly.

“Uh-huh.” Zayn lets go of Harry to dry himself off, his hand trailing down Harry’s side as he goes.

It really is ridiculously domestic back in the bedroom, as Zayn pulls on his jeans and a t-shirt for whatever he’s doing today, and Harry gets dressed for his day of rehearsals. He’ll have time to change before he hangs out with Kendall this evening.

“It felt like drowning.” Zayn says suddenly. Harry turns around from where he was pulling his hair back into a bun. Zayn’s back is to Harry, and he’s staring at the window, rather than looking at Harry. “What happened, in there. With the water and the choking—it felt like drowning. Or it did in my head, at least.”

“You know what drowning feels like?”

Zayn glances over his shoulder at Harry, his face blank. “Yeah.”

Harry lets out a breath, and goes to wrap his arms around Zayn, press himself to his back, so he can stroke at his stomach, his fingers tracing the scars he’s learned so well by now. “Then we don’t do that again.” He presses his lips to Zayn’s ear, his cheek. “I guess from now on I’ll just have to blow you in the shower instead.”

Zayn snorts out a laugh, and Harry smiles to himself, triumphant, and kisses Zayn’s cheek again. “You’re okay now?”

“Yeah.” Zayn turns in his arms, and then his hand is on Harry’s cheek, cradling it like Harry’s precious. “Harry, you’re so…”

“Amazing? Sexy? Talented?” Harry fills in. He’s feeling cheeky today. Days that start with shower sex tend to be good days.

Zayn isn’t smiling, though. He’s just looking at Harry, and it’s like—he’d always done this, been so bad at hiding how he felt. How he looked at Harry and Harry couldn’t say anything, because there’d been too much there, like Harry was the entire world. Like his whole heart is in his eyes, and it’s all there for Harry. So much, so easily.

“All of that and more,” Zayn murmurs, his hand gentle on Harry’s skin. Harry’s heart thumps. How had he survived without this? Without Zayn and his sincerity and the way he makes Harry feel better, feel like more? How had he ever thought he could live without this? That he could love anyone else like this?

The thought hits him, reels him back. Zayn must feel it, because he drops his hand, slips out of Harry’s hold. “Sorry.”

“No, I—” I love you. It’d be easy to say. Harry would mean it. Maybe he’s meant it for ten years, but he’d mean it now. He’d loved the boy, with all his laughter and passion. He loves this man, with all his scars and rough edges. The emptiness in him is filling, full of Zayn, until it’s barely like Harry had lost him at all, like Harry hadn’t broken apart, as long as Zayn’s here. “You too,” he finishes, then catches Zayn’s arm to pull him back to kiss him again, until he can focus on that. “You too.”

\---

“So,” Kendall hums, her nails trailing over Harry’s forearm. It’s chilly outside, compared to how warm it was inside, despite the bright lights of the paparazzi that they’re both ignoring. It’s the price of hanging out with Kendell, and it’s good for both of them anyway. “Are we getting two cars or one?”

It’s a real question. Kendall’s always been easy like that, but he also thinks that’s why they could never quite manage anything more. They get along, and he likes her a lot, but neither of them have managed to ever be invested in it more than they’re both hot and the sex is good. It’s nothing like it is with Zayn.

“No.”

“Didn’t think so.” She smiles, and pats Harry’s cheek. “Heard you were shacked up with someone.”

“You mean you heard about me and Jeff’s torrid affair?” he retorts, clutching at his chest. “No! The secret’s out.”

She smiles, but it’s the slightly bewildered one she gets when she doesn’t get Harry’s humor. “People have seen you with Zayn a lot.”

Shit. Harry doesn’t tense, and he knows it, but he’s on alert. Good thing he’s not drunk, and so hadn’t gone on any rants about how Zayn’s eyes sparkle, or how Harry can’t even conceive of the things he’s gone through and the fact that he’s still standing is amazing. “We’ve got five years to catch up on.”

“I’m not judging, babe. Just warning you.” She pats his cheek again. “So, separate cars?”

“Yeah. You can take this one,” Harry offers, and she kisses him on the cheek before she gets into the car that’s already there.

Harry only has to wait a few more minutes for his car, then he’s off too, back home. Zayn hasn’t texted him back, when he asked if he could come over, so it looks like he’s going back home, even though it’s still early. Harry waves goodbye to the driver at the gate, then looks at his house. It looks empty. Half-finished, because it is half-finished, but Harry doesn’t want to go in yet. Doesn’t want to go in and go to sleep, alone. It’s not like he’s been spending all his nights with Zayn, because Harry’s busy and Zayn needs his time alone, but…after this morning, he doesn’t want to sleep alone. And he wants to be up if Zayn needs him, because he’s been doing better but Harry’s not going to pretend that the drowning thing hadn’t happened, even if Zayn shrugged it off.

He checks the time, but it’s still early enough the froyo place will be open. Everyone saw him leave the bar already, so they won’t be looking for him to go out again tonight, he should be okay on his own.

Fifteen minutes later, Harry’s back in his car, in his incognito gear—basically a big Packers sweatshirt with a hood that can cover his hair. The boys always laugh at him for his inability to go unnoticed, but Harry’d like to see them manage it, with distinctive hair like his. And he’s just not as good as the other boys are at getting away from fans who want to talk to him. It’s not his fault.

But tonight, it looks clear. The people at the froyo shop know him, and so they don’t make a big deal out of him being there. He just makes a bit of small talk with Kristen, the cashier, who’s in the middle of classes at UCLA and always stressed about them, then collects his usual and heads back out to his car. It being LA, he’d had to park a while away, even at 1 AM, but that just gives him time to eat his yogurt, and there isn’t really anyone around to see him and snap a picture of Harry Styles failing to walk and eat at the same time.

He hits the unlock button on his keys, so the lights flash in the distance—then suddenly a hand falls hard on his shoulder and there’s a voice in his ear whispering harshly, “Keep walking.”

“Who—” Harry tries to turn his head, but all he gets is a flash of a white guy, tall, with a blank face scar on the temple nearest him. “What—”

“Come with me. Don’t make a fuss and I won’t have to hurt you.”

Shit. Shit shit shit. Harry doesn’t—there were drills, once, of what to do, but those were always predicated on there being bodyguards, and Harry doesn’t know how to fight fuck—

“Stop panicking. Slowly, take your phone out, drop it.” Harry hesitates, and the man’s hand tightens around his neck, digging into Harry’s skin. He does as he’s told, juggling his yogurt until he can drop his phone on the ground. It hits with a crack that makes Harry wince.

“Good. This doesn’t have to be harder than that. Eat your yogurt.” The man presses down with his hand, hard, and Harry’s being steered away from his car. What’s going to happen—why would anyone want to kidnap him? Ransom?

“What do you want?” he gets out.

“I don’t want anything.” The man says it easily, like this is a normal place to have a conversation. Is the Arrow here where is he he always came before. “My employer is angry with you, though. Thinks you betrayed your boyfriend.”

“My boyfriend?” Harry echoes. How did—did people know about Zayn? Kendall had said people were starting to suspect, but how did they jump to boyfriend? And how had he betrayed him? And who would care if he had? “Who?”

“I didn’t ask. This way.” Harry tries to look back at the crowded road, but there’s no one there, and in front of them is a tiny alley between two buildings, and who knows what’s on the other side. The fire escape looks like it’s going to fall apart, so Harry doubts there’s anyone in the buildings to see him.

“I can pay ransom. I can pay whatever,” Harry offers. He needs to—what is he supposed to—why? Why is this happening he’d just wanted froyo, he’d just—

“And if it was up to me, I’d take that. But it’s not, and I stay bought. I—”

Harry jumps at the sudden, deafening bang, then the alley’s blinding bright. The man’s hand on him is still there and Harry can’t see and then there’s suddenly a body hits him and he’s stumbling away, out of the man’s grip, and when Harry blinks away the light the Arrow is in front of him, between him and the man, and Harry could cheer. He’s never been more thankful to see the Arrow, to see him with his bow pointed at someone else.

“I was wondering if you’d show up,” the scarred man says, cordially. “The flash bang was good.”

“You?” The Arrow asks. He sounds surprised. “What are you doing here?”

“I go where I’m told.” The man reaches back, and then he’s holding two long, wickedly curved knives, that catch the light and glint dangerously. Harry swallows. He trusts the Arrow but those—he doesn’t—fuck he’s scared, terrified, like he’s never been before. He’d never known anything felt like this. He can’t move. Can barely think. “And I’ve been told to bring that boy in.”

“Over my dead body,” the Arrow hisses, and the man smiles. It’s a terrifying smile, because it reaches his eyes but it somehow still looks cold.

“If you insist.”

“Stay behind me,” the Arrow mutters, to Harry, and Harry nods, takes another step back. Should he run? But what if there’s someone else waiting—what if the Arrow has another plan—he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to be doing—

Then the man is moving and the Arrow gets off two shots, both of them deflected by the knives, before the man’s on him. One knife slices towards his face, the other down, and Harry makes some sort of noise, in warning or in fear—but the Arrow’s twisting, and the knife towards his face is blocked with his bow, the other knife hitting only air. Harry can’t follow it after that, can only see the knives and the bow and fists and kicks and the glint of arrowheads flying past the other man’s head. He’s seen the Arrow fight before, but it’s never been like this, and he doesn’t know what that means, but then there’s red, red of blood, and the Arrow throws himself back, drawing his bow.

He’s panting hard, and there’s a stain on his arm, a slice through sleeve. His arm. He’s injured. The Arrow’s injured, and Harry hadn’t even thought of that really, that the Arrow could hurt. Could die. He could die.

“If I say go,” the Arrow mutters, his eyes on his opponent. He’s panting, but the man is too, his eyes glinting. But there’s only blood on the knife. “You go. You don’t look at me. You go.”

“But—”

“Back out the other way. Got it?”

He doesn’t wait for a nod, just goes, more arrows flying before they engage again, and Harry doesn’t think he’s imagining it, how the Arrow’s being driven back. How Harry has to keep backing up to stay behind him, how he’s faltering. He wasn’t supposed to falter. He’s supposed to be the Arrow. But he’s on the ground more, and he’s just fending off the other man, no more arrows, just the harsh grunts and smack of flesh and leather.

The Arrow takes another step back, hits some garbage, then he’s on the ground, on his back, and the other man smile again and his knife is driving down—

The sound of sirens splits the air, and the other man jerks, looks behind him, and the Arrow yells “Run!” and then he’s got another arrow on the string but it’s gone straight up, missing the other man by a meter, and Harry turns to run just as the fire escape crashes down, pulled apart by the Arrow’s shot.

Harry freezes, as metal crashes, on and on and on, drowning out the sound of the sirens. The Arrow was under there. Right under there. He’d—why’d he done that, the police were coming, he could have just held out, he didn’t need to do that.

It feels eerily silent when it’s done, even though the sirens are still sounding. Harry watches, as a figure pulls itself to its feet, on his side of the wreckage, and straightens slowly, painfully, until Harry can see the hood. Thank god. Thank fucking god.

The Arrow turns towards the wreckage, looks through it. There’s someone on the other side, Harry can see—the other man, it must be. He must have gotten out of the way too.

They both just stand there, staring at each other, as the sirens wail. Then the other man nods, and turns, and goes.

The Arrow mutters something to himself, and Harry runs forward again, back towards him.

“Thank you.” It’s all he can think to say. If he focuses on the Arrow maybe he can not focus on how he was just almost kidnapped.

“Are you okay?” The Arrow demands, his voice harsh.

“I’m fine. Not a scratch. Lost my yogurt.” Harry doesn’t even bother smiling at his own joke. The Arrow is panting still, and he leans against the wreckage of the fire escape, drawing deep breaths. Harry’s never seen him like this. “Are you? Do you have to get out of here before the police come?”

“They aren’t coming. Unless you called them, or someone else saw.”

“But—”

The Arrow shakes his head, then touches something at his belt. The sirens stop. “Decoy. He couldn’t think he had time to circle around.”

“Oh. That was clever!” Harry presses his hand to his chest. His heart is pounding, and not in the good way. Not in the way of a stage rush. Not even in the way of doing stupid things Louis dared him to. He doesn’t think he likes near death experiences.

“That was lucky,” the Arrow corrects. He looks at the fire escape, then past it. His voice sounds different, like he’s forgotten to regulate it as much. “Why was he here?”

“You know him?”

“I’ve seen him before.” The Arrow reaches behind him, then his hand closes on empty air.

Harry reaches down, grabs the bow from next to him, and hands it over. He’s never held the bow before. It feels—well, he doesn’t know what a bow is supposed to be, but it feels solid. Rough. Heavier than Harry expected. Enough to have saved him.

The Arrow relaxes visibly when he holds the bow, like a boy and his teddy bear. He strokes it, once, probably checking it for damage, then puts it over his back, and straightens. “You should—”

“You’re hurt.” It’s clear, when he straightens—the gash in his leathers, over his ribs, deep enough it goes right through and Harry can see skin underneath, and a darker color he’s sure is blood. Blood. He got hurt, saving Harry, keeping him safe. Mostly on instinct, Harry steps closer, to inspect it. “That’s deep, shit. Do you need—”

“It’s fine.” The Arrow steps back, but Harry ignores him. It’s the least he can do. He has to do something, or else he really is going to panic.

“No, it’s deep and probably dirty. Here.” Harry strips off his sweatshirt, folds it up quickly. He’s hurt himself enough that he knows basic first aid. “We need to keep pressure on it—”

“It’s just a flesh wound, you need to go,” The Arrow bats his hands away, but Harry keeps ignoring him. He needs to focus on this. On doing something.

“I don’t know how much blood you lost,” Harry continues. He hadn’t seen it happen. Didn’t know how long the Arrow had been fighting, with blood seeping out of him, deep enough it’s carved bits out of his skin. Harry can’t even imagine. Harry didn’t want to imagine. That could have been Harry, if the Arrow hadn’t come. Who knows what would have happened.

“You need to go home. And get bodyguards. I’m fine.” The Arrow is pushing at Harry’s hands, more urgent now, but it’s not hard and Harry ignores it, as he tries to peel the leather away from his skin. He needs to see if it’ll need stitches. Needs to see what happened to him, trying to save Harry. His fingers brush over his ribs, each one there, then over an older scar, a gash up his ribs that’s jagged like a lightning bolt.

Harry’s fingers brush over it once—then he traces it again. He’s done that before. He knows that scar. He knows that scar, had touched it this morning. Unless there are two people with scars like that, two people with scars in the exact same place and shape. Two people who appeared in LA at the same time, who know how to fight. That there’s someone other than Zayn who has this scar. Who has bruises all the time. Who disappears at night. Who stayed alive by violence and desperation on the island. Someone other than Zayn, who always wanted to be a superhero.

“Tell me I’m hallucinating.” Harry’s voice feels loud. The Arrow’s breath catches. “Please. Tell me I don’t know this scar.”

“Harry—”

“Just tell me!” Harry traces it again. He knows it. He can feel the Arrow tensing as his finger follows the scar, like he understands what’s happening. “Tell me you don’t know what I’m talking about. Tell me I’m hysterical.”

“Harry—”

“Tell me that!” His voice is ripped out of him, and he takes a step back. The Arrow’s the same height as Zayn. The same breadth. The bits of his chin Harry can see are the same. Everything makes so much sense now but it can’t be true. It can’t be. “Tell me I don’t know you. Tell me Zayn’s safe and asleep right now!”

Slowly, the Arrow straightens, and his hand goes to his hood. Harry wants to close his eyes. He doesn’t want to see. Doesn’t want to know this. Doesn’t want to see as the hood goes back, and it’s Zayn there, looking back at him in the half light of the alley.

The area around his eyes is colored in, darkened; his hair’s pushed back, kept messily out of his eyes. But Harry would know that face anywhere. He’s dreamed of it for ten years. Thought it was lost for five. Just got it back. And now—

“Zayn?” he croaks, his voice breaking like he’s sixteen.

The Arrow—Zayn—sighs. “Hey, Haz."


	11. Chapter 10

Harry reels back, like if he gets away from him it won’t be true. “No.”

“Harry—”

“No, this is a prank. A one time thing.” Harry shakes his head. “Tell me that.”

“Harry…”

“All this time?” Harry demands. He feels flat-footed, caught off guard. He hates this. Hates not knowing how to react. Not being able to react right. “All this time, it was—it was you?”

“Yeah.” Zayn lifts his head, like he’s proud of it. Fucking proud.

“You.” Harry shakes his head again. He’s dreaming. This is a nightmare. It has to be. It all has to be and he’ll wake up next to Zayn, curled in close and warm and safe. “Well. I feel stupid.”

“Haz—”

Harry swallows, and pushes it down. Pushes it all down. This is why he doesn’t care. This is why he didn’t say anything, because now he can smile wry and offhand. He’s fine. He’s not ripping apart again. “Must have been a laugh, lying to me. Trying to see how far you could mess with me.”

“It wasn’t that. I couldn’t tell you.” His eyes catch the light. They look sincere. He always looks sincere.

“Seems pretty easy. Open your mouth and say it. One of the dozen fucking times you were flirting with me and making me feel like shit because I was trying to choose between you and you.”

“Harry—”

“No, it’s fine. I respect your choice. You chose not to tell me. That’s fine.” Harry takes a breath. He can’t deal with this. Not here. Not in front of Zayn. “Now I’m choosing to tell you I’m leaving.”

“I couldn’t tell you.” Zayn takes a step forward; Harry takes a step back. He doesn’t know what he’ll do if Zayn touches him. “I couldn’t, Harry.”

“Why not!”

“Because I wasn’t going to let you get hurt!” Zayn snaps back, as fervent as any vow he’s ever made. “I wasn’t going to paint a target on your back.”

“Clearly that worked.” Harry gestures. “I feel very safe.”

“You are.” Zayn’s hand goes over the bow again. Harry’s held that hand. Harry’s had that hand touch him, gently as he’s touching the bow right now. He wants to throw up. “I’ll always keep you safe.”

“By lying to me?” Harry drawls. “Well done. A plus job.”

“I couldn’t!” Zayn moves, all at once, and then his hand’s on Harry’s shoulder, the opposite one from the one the scarred man had held before. His eyes are alight, all that passion, all that intensity Harry’s always loved, shining through the darkened area around his eyes. “I wasn’t going to let another person I loved get hurt!”

“You aren’t on the island anymore.” Harry had thought Zayn knew that. Had thought he’d been realizing that. That he was done with the violence and pain. That he had come back to Harry. That he was getting better.

“It doesn’t matter. People still get hurt here. People get hurt everywhere, and I couldn’t—I couldn’t let that happen again.” Zayn’s hand tightens. “Shado. Slade. You. Freddie. Louis. People I love get hurt. I get people I love hurt. I get people I love dead. You weren’t going to be another one.”

Harry shakes off his hand, or Zayn lets him go. He backs away. “And lying to me was keeping me safe?” His voice is even. Polite. He’s okay. If he can stay like this he’ll be okay, Zayn won’t see what’s cracking in him.

“Yes!” Zayn grasps at the air, like he’s looking for words. “If you didn’t know—if you were separate—you weren’t a part of this.”

“I’m not?” Harry swings his arms open, to gesture around him. “So it must have been someone else talking about the Arrow on TV—”

“And I told you not to! I told you it wasn’t safe!”

“You still talked to me.”

“You talked to me! I was keeping you safe.”

“I never asked you to.”

“You didn’t need to.” It hisses out, and Harry hates himself for how it resonates. Zayn, who wanted to be a superhero. Zayn, who pulled him out of the fire. “I told you I wouldn’t let you fall.”

It’s a gut punch. That moment in the shower, when they’d moved together, when they’d been together. When Harry’d thought he’d known him, that they were good.

And with that, Harry breaks. He can’t be neutral, not anymore, not when Zayn’s being such an asshole and Harry’s heart is aching and Zayn could have died tonight, could have died so often, Harry could have lost him again, and he’d kept Harry out when Harry’d thought they’d been coming together.

“You’re so fucking selfish, do you know that? You always have been.”

Zayn flinches. “I—”

Harry can’t stop, now he’s started. “Did you even think that we’d just gotten you back? Did you think about how your family would feel if you were killed out doing this? How I’d feel?” Zayn opens his mouth, but Harry keeps going. “You didn’t, because you never have. You just do what you want. Even when it’ll get you killed!”

“I had to!” Zayn’s hand is tight on his bow. “I had to,” he repeats, and it feels deeper than the first yell. It feels like a promise. Like he’s repeating something. “I’m helping. This is helping. I’m making a difference.”

“You can make a difference without risking your life!”

“Not a real one!”

“You approved of this!” Zayn’s hands fly up, an old frustrated tic. “When you didn’t know who I was, you thought the Arrow was right.”

“That was before I knew it was you!” Harry’s hand is in his hair again, because he doesn’t know where else it could go. He’s arguing with Zayn in the Arrow’s leathers in an alley where he almost died. He doesn’t know anything anymore. God, he feels like such an idiot. He feels like he had that day in March, like he’d missed everything important and now he was left holding only empty air. “That was when I thought you were getting better!”

“Better?” Zayn repeats.

“Better! That you were—you know what I mean, you’re painting again, you’re sleeping.” He had been getting better. Harry had thought—but what did he know? “You were getting better, I was getting you back.”

“This isn’t me being broken.” Zayn draws himself up. He looks like a hero, like this. Slim and straight and muscled, with his bow and his hood, all shadows and light and beauty and fervent belief. Belief that is going to get him killed. “I am broken. We both know that. But this isn’t that. This is who I am now. I’m not the kid I was when I was twenty, Harry. I’ll never be him again. I’m broken, yeah. But I’m stronger too.” He takes a breath, his head tilting back proudly. “I am the Arrow. And if you were only okay with me, or the Arrow, when you didn’t know that—then you didn’t care about me.”

Harry refuses to wince. Refuses to show it hurt. He’s reeling and can’t—he just can’t think. He’s okay. If he doesn’t get mad Zayn can’t see his hurt. If he never threw in he can’t hurt. “I’m going home.”

“Good. Get some bodyguards. I can’t always be here.”

“Evidently.” Harry lets it roll off his tongue, then he turns to go. It won’t take him long to circle back to his car.

At the end of the alley, he looks back. Zayn’s pulled his hood back up, so he’s just the Arrow now.

“You do make a difference,” he calls. “Without the hood. You knew that once.”

Then he leaves.

\---

“So, you haven’t seen Harry, then?”

Zayn ignores Louis and takes another shot at the dummy. It hits a few centimeters below the throat. Louis knows the answer perfectly well. Harry hasn’t talked to him for twenty-four hours at least, since he last saw him walking out of the alley. Well, since Harry last saw Zayn; Zayn had last seen him when he trailed him into the gates of his house, because he wasn’t sure that scarred man wasn’t going to try again. But he hasn’t seen him since then. Hasn’t talked to him.

“You don’t have anything on the man who attacked him?”

“Nadia’s working on it. We’re going to have to tell her something soon; she won’t believe my excuses for much longer.” Louis hums. “I don’t think she believes them right now, really. I think she’s just humoring me.”

“As long as she gets me my information, I don’t care.” Another shot. This one goes slightly wide. Fuck. _Love makes you stupid, pretty boy. Don’t fall in love_. Slade hadn’t done well with that, and look where it got him. Gone mad, driven mad by mirakuru and grief, and Zayn’s arrow in his eye. Gone to see Shado in death. At least that hadn’t happened to Zayn. “I gave her fucking DNA, what’s taking her so long?”

“Maybe the fact that she’s doing this while working as my PA and covering her tracks so no one notices that Louis Tomlinson’s PA is hacking into national databases?” Louis drawls. “You’re being pissy. This is what happens when you stop getting laid.”

“This is what happens when people are trying to blow up a city!” Zayn spins, the bow still in his hand. “I am trying to save people here, it has nothing to do with Harry. I’m trying to save people and I can’t because I don’t fucking know why the same person who was defacing mosques and stealing bombs was also trying to kidnap Harry!”

Louis listens to him, his eyebrows raised. “And which one of those are you angriest about?”

“Fuck off.”

“He’s got bodyguards. He’s safe. If you called him—”

“I’m not apologizing.” Zayn takes a breath, then turns back to the dummy. He has his bow. He has his bow, and the hood, and a mission. _They’ll listen to you. You have to stop it_. The arrow thuds into the dummy’s nose.

“Yeah, trust me, I know that one.” Louis snorts. “You don’t have to apologize. Just talk.”

“He made his position clear.”

“He was surprised and had just been attacked. If I’d talked to you right after Freddie was attacked, I’d probably have reacted similarly.”

“You didn’t. And you hadn’t been the Arrow’s biggest fan before. What should it matter if it was me or someone else? It’s the same mission.” If Zayn can even figure out the mission. What he’s supposed to be doing.

“Because he’s in love with you.” Zayn’s hand slips, and the arrow skids off the dummy, landing on the floor with a clatter.

“That shouldn’t—”

“Shut up. It does matter, and you know it.”

“He’s not in love with me anyway.”

“That is the biggest load of bullshit I’ve ever heard.”

“If he can’t accept the Arrow, if he thinks it’s me being broken, then he doesn’t know me, and he doesn’t love me. If he even loved me before.”

“This is—” Louis makes a strangled sound of annoyance. “I feel like Liam, shit.

“What—it doesn’t matter.” Zayn takes another shot. It’s closer. “This is better anyway. He’s safer like this. Away from me.”

“That’s a tired superhero line, and it never works.”

Zayn turns, lowers his bow. Louis doesn’t get it. He doesn’t know. He’s part of this, but he didn’t hear the bullet splatter in Charles’s head, he didn’t see Shado fall with her throat red with blood, he didn’t feel his arrow dig into Slade’s eye. “The last girl I slept with died because I couldn’t save her. My best friend on the island, the one who taught me everything I know, died because I fucked up so much I had to kill him. A man sat next to me on a plane and ended up blowing his brains out so I could live. I left the band and I hurt all you enough you didn’t talk to me for nine months. Shit, even Perrie, I fucked her over enough. And now Harry was almost kidnapped because I haven’t been able to stop the man who tried to take him. So tell me, Lou. Tell me that I don’t hurt the people I care about. Tell me Harry’s not better off away from me.”

“Zed—”

“No, tell me,” Zayn demands. It’s what Harry had said last night. He couldn’t answer that either, and Harry had stared at him like he was the plague, like he could finally see all the blood on his hands. _It’s all your fault._ “Can you?”

“I don’t—”

“I’m selfish, and it’s because of that they’re hurt.” Slade’s voice. Harry’s. _Selfish_. Zayn’s always been selfish.

“Let me finish my bloody sentence,” Louis snaps. “Yes. You were selfish sometimes. Yes, you hurt us. Hurt me. But you’re doing good now. This is good. Harry knows that, once he’s gotten it together a bit.”

“Nine months later?” Zayn asks. “Because that’s how long it took last time. At least. I’ve been frozen out by Harry before, Lou. I know how it goes.” He turns back to the target. “We might not have the mercenary, but there must be something else.”

“Zayn—”

“Give me something to shoot or I’m shooting you,” Zayn tells him, sharp, and Louis laughs, because he’s fearless and he’s never been afraid of Zayn, even when he should be.

“Fine. Get suited up. We’ll find you something to shoot. And Harry will come around.”

“This is better.”

_You’re a selfish bastard, Malik. It’s your fault Shado’s dead._

_You’re so fucking selfish, you know? You always have been._

_Her or you, Malik? Choose. You know the smart choice._

Zayn shakes his head to clear it, draws his bow, and shoots. The arrow hits the dummy’s heart, slightly off-center.

\---

Harry takes a bite of his sandwich. It’s a good sandwich, better than most green rooms have, and he can’t even enjoy it, because the TV’s on, and the news anchor talking about the Arrow’s latest moves—rescuing some young trans boy from getting beat up. Harry’s spent the better part of three days trying not to think about the Arrow, or Zayn, or any of that. Nothing helps, of course—not yoga, not writing, not his friends, not even calling his mum—but he’s trying. And this TV isn’t helping, and of course there’s no remote, and he can’t pay attention to the conversation between the other boys when the TV keeps on saying ‘Arrow’ ever five seconds.

He gets up off his chair, goes to the door. “Excuse me?” he grabs a passing PA. “Can we have the TV turned off?”

The man looks at the TV. There’s a blurry security image of the Arrow with his bow drawn, looking heroic. “Sure, if you want. I’d have thought you’d want to see this, though. Aren’t you friends with the Arrow?”

“Sort of.” Harry gives his best convincing smile. “Can we get it turned off, please?”

“Sure.” The PA pulls out a chair, steps up onto it so he can reach the TV. Well, Harry could have done that too. “I can’t believe you’ve met him. Is he as cool as he looks? Is he more Superman or Batman, like, in outlook? He saved my cousin,” the PA continues, as he presses a button, and the TV turns off. “He was attacked, and the police were never going to get there, or probably pay attention to him if they had, but then the Arrow came and got—”

“That’s great,” Harry interrupts. He doesn’t need to hear this. Doesn’t need to hear about Zayn in danger. About Zayn being a hero. About Zayn being so close to disappearing again, for good this time. So close to leaving that hole in Harry for good. By choice.

“Yeah, of course.” The PA jumps down, his dreads shaking as he lands. “Tell him thanks for me if you see him? Tell him even if those bigshots don’t like him, we appreciate what he’s doing.”

“We?” Harry can’t help but ask.

“I’m not from Beverly Hills.” The PA grins at him. “There’s a lot of LA you’ve never seen.” He gives Harry a little salute. “That good?” he gestures towards the TV.

“Yeah. Thanks.” Harry huffs out a breath as he goes. Next time he sees the Arrow. He’ll probably never see the Arrow again. He never wants to see the Arrow again.

When he turns back to his chair, three sets of eyes are on him.

“You okay?” Liam asks.

“Fine.” Harry crosses his arms over his chest. He’s being petulant, he knows, but he is fine. He doesn’t want to talk about it at least. He wants—fuck, he wants to talk it over with Zayn, and he can’t, but there’s not grief where that thought comes, like the past five years, there’s just anger.

“Zayn not making you sleep on the couch?” Niall suggests, around a bite of his own sandwich.

Harry almost chokes, but he thinks he hides it well. “Couches can actually be much better for you to sleep on, really. Mattresses can be surprisingly bad—”

“Cut the crap, you aren’t fooling anyone.” Niall kicks gently at his leg. “Did you really think we didn’t know you and Zayn figured your shit out?”

Harry glances at Louis, but Louis gives his most innocent grin. “They figured it out too. None of us are stupid, Styles. And all of us know both of you.”

Or they think they do. Think they know Zayn, but what do they know? When are they going on, already? Harry needs to get out of this room. Needs to get back under the camera, where everything makes sense. Back on stage, where the adrenaline pushes everything else away.

“So?” Liam prompts. “You two seemed so good.”

“You didn’t see us together.”

“Sure we did. We hung out with the both of you.”

“We weren’t…it wasn’t, like. We weren’t together.” Zayn had said. Had said they weren’t anything, that he couldn’t, and Harry had welcomed it. Good thing he had. Now it isn’t a real breakup. Now Zayn had only lied to a friend, not to a—whatever they were heading towards.

“Sure.” Niall snorts. “If you say so.”

“I know I always bugged you about settling down, but now I’m not surprised.” Liam crosses his leg over his knee, leans forward. The dad look works much better on him now that he’s not eighteen, Harry thinks, maybe a little spitefully. “It was always him for you.”

“Nah, I just liked not settling down.” Harry smiles, gets up. They don’t know anything. They don’t know what Zayn’s been doing. That he’s been out there, trying to get himself killed, when Harry’d just gotten him back. What if he’d died, some mugger getting the drop on him? Harry wouldn’t even know. Zayn would have just disappeared again, and Harry would have—he doesn’t know what he would have done, but he’s not sure his heart could have taken it. “I’m going to the toilet.”

“We’re just teasing, Harry,” Liam demurs, reaching out, but Harry just shakes his head.

“And I have to piss, so unless you want to tease me into the toilet….”

“Oh, fine. Be back in—”

“Thank you, Liam, I do in fact have a watch.” Harry moves his wrist slightly so they won’t see that he isn’t actually wearing a watch today. He has a phone. It’s basically the same.

“I’ll go too.” Louis rises from the couch, shaking out his limbs.

“Really? We girls now, need to go to the loo together?” Niall asks, but he’s taking advantage of Louis moving by stretching out on the space.

“Someone needs to keep an eye on him. He might end up abducted between here and the toilet.” Louis makes a face at Niall, but it’s—Harry hadn’t told anyone about that. About what happened. About the kidnapping, or the fight, or the Arrow. He hadn’t said. Louis could just be teasing, it could just be a coincidence.

Or it could not be. Harry’s not willing to doubt anything, anymore.

“If you’re coming…” Harry leads the way out of the green room, Louis following him. Louis does actually tail him to the bathroom, but then he doesn’t go, just waits as Harry does. In a band where they didn’t grow up together, it might be weird, Louis just standing there watching him piss, but as it is Harry only thinks twice about it because then why did Louis come at all?

“Are you following me?” he asks.

Louis raises his eyebrows. “Yeah, I’m stalking you. You caught me. The last ten years have all been an elaborate ruse.”

“I can pee on my own.”

“Sure? You’re not going to fall over? Because I remember—”

“And I remember the time I distracted everyone when you threw up in a garbage can backstage of the O2 arena.” Harry crosses his arms. “We can both play this game.”

Louis laughs. “You’re a well matched pair, you know? I forget you’re a sneaky bastard, sometimes.”

“Good.” Harry smirks. “That’s the point. Now, were you following me?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“About?” Louis’d been quiet in there, suspiciously so. Usually he’s the first to jump on the ‘let’s tease Harry’ train.

“You need to talk to him.”

“Him?”

“Don’t be stupid. You have to talk to him.”

“I don’t have to do anything.” Harry finishes washing his hands, but he doesn’t want to leave, not yet. “And if you knew what it was about…” he trails off. Louis’s not looking away. Louis’s always been a shitty liar. “You know.”

“What? I—”

“You know,” Harry repeats. Of course Louis knows. Partners in crime. How close they got again recently. “You even warned me about it. You said he wasn’t the same person. I thought you were talking about the trauma, but you were talking about this, weren’t you?”

Louis clearly considers denying again, then sets his shoulders. “Yeah. I know. And that’s why I know you need to call him.”

Harry considers arguing, but it’s not worth it. He takes a step towards the door—and Louis blocks him, because he’s an asshole. “Let me out, please.”

“No. Listen. He lied, I know, but—”

“He didn’t lie, actually.” Harry’s thought about this part. “It’s not like I ever asked him if he was the Arrow. He didn’t lie to me. He just didn’t tell me everything.”

“Yeah, exactly.” That took the winds out of Louis’s sails. Louis never has known what to do when someone won’t argue with him. “So—why are you freezing him out?”

Harry refuses to rise to Louis’s bait. He’s learned that much, at least. “You’re one to talk about freezing him out. There was a time—“

“And I’m feeling really sympathetic towards Liam then, and it’s weird and I want it to stop, so you have to talk to him.”

“No.”

“Harry.”

“I can’t see why you’re encouraging him either,” Harry says, even. He has to stay even. He has to focus on the positive. He will. “You’re letting Freddie get attached, and then what happens when he gets himself killed and you have to explain to your son what happened to Uncle Freddie? Why would you—”

“Because what we’re doing is important.” Louis doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t flinch. Like it’s that easy. Like he can just decide that, that it’s more important than Zayn’s life. “And because I knew I couldn’t talk Zayn out of it, so I’m helping him do it more safely.”

“You’re helping?” Harry flicks his gaze over Louis. “Don’t tell me you’re secretly badass too.”

“It’s more of a Oracle situation right now, and you need to stop being a fucking prick and listen to him.”

“I listened to him plenty.”

“You’re so—” Louis cuts himself off, takes a deep breath. That deep breath is a new phenomenon, one Harry thinks he learned with Freddie, when he can’t just explode at him. “I have no idea why Zayn’s so in love with you, you’re so frustrating.”

“He’s not.”

“What?”

“He’s not in love with me,” Harry clarifies. “He never said it.”

Louis lets out a long, frustrated sigh. “Harry. He’s sitting in his base missing targets because of you. He’s in love with you.”

“He never said it,” Harry repeats. Louis doesn’t know Zayn better than him, and he never said it. “It’s Zayn. He always says it, he’d say it to people he just met. And he never said it to me. So—”

“Yeah, because he’s terrified!”

“Well so am I.” It snaps out of Harry, unwilling. “He could die, Louis. I already lost him once. Losing him again, now—I can’t do it. I can’t.”

“Well, he’s not going to change who he is because you’re giving him the silent treatment.” Louis reaches behind him to push open the door, because he likes to have the last word. “So you’re losing him now too. And, Haz.” Louis pauses, and the anger’s gone, just the sincerity, the big brother Harry’s never really had but always had in him. “From someone who thought he died thinking I was furious at him—”

His face looks drawn, in the harsh fluorescent lives, and Harry has a flash of him in those horrible first few days, after they’d heard about Zayn; how small Louis had seemed when he wasn’t trying to take care of all of them. How one night Harry had found him crying, and Louis hadn’t even glared, closed himself off like he’d used to with Harry. ‘Do you think he knows?’ Louis had asked, quiet, in the night. ‘That I don’t really hate him. I never did.’ Harry hadn’t had an answer then had just cuddled with him and let him cry, and in the morning Louis was himself again, if contained and mourning. Louis looks like that, like he’s remembering that.

“It’s not worth it,” Louis finishes, pushing his hair out of his face. “It’s really not.” He swallows, then that expression is gone, like he’s pushed the vulnerability down. “Now, I’m under strict orders not to let you go alone anywhere, so, come on, we’ve got to go back.”

“Since when do you follow orders?”

Louis winks. “Since the guy giving them has a bow and arrows and has been on edge since his boyfriend started giving him silent treatment.”

Harry manages a smile, then follows Louis out of the bathroom. He doesn’t get it. Louis doesn’t get it, because he has Freddie and a company and a life he wants, Harry thinks, right before the lights go on and the music starts. Harry’d said, once, in an old interview he found again recently, that he’d never found anything that felt like being on stage. That’s still true, he knows, feels, as the crowd yells and Liam starts singing. But loving Zayn had come close.

\---

_The labs are dark, empty. A single emergency light flickers above the entrance, and the hum of an incubator purrs, an experiment left to simmer overnight, but other than that they’re quiet, for all their size—the full span of a floor of the building, a city block. Out of the window, the city sparkles, spread out and out and out, all those lights._

_The stomping of feet approaches, then the door swings open, and six dark clad figures come in, their boots carelessly loud._

_“Fan out.” The one in the middle says. He’s the only one not wearing a mask, so the scar on his face is visible when he turns his head. His face is calm, his eyes cold.“Hernandez, Polowski, first floor. O’Reilly, Smith, second floor. Cassidy, you’re with me here. Find it.”_

_“Sir.” The others salute, and four duck back out the door. The last splits to the left, searching over the tables, pushing aside beakers and tools with heavy hands. The cold-eyed man walks down the center aisle, towards the windows. He picks up a test tube as he passes it, scans the label, then sets it down again with a sneer._

_Something crackles, and he lifts a hand to his ear. “Found it,” one of his men says. “On our way up now.”_

_“Roger, Smith. Hernandez, Polowski. Rendezvous on the roof.” He raises a hand, and Cassidy looks up, nods, and starts heading back._

_“Hernandez, Polowski,” he repeats. “Acknowledge.” He pauses, then, “Acknowledge.”_

_“Sir!” a crackling voice, frantic, “Sir, he took it, we—” it cuts off, the line dead. The man smiles._

_“Cassidy,” he says, calmly, and pulls out a knife, inspects the edge. It gleams in the emergency light. “We have company.”_

_As if on cue, the door swings open, and the Arrow is silhouetted in it for a second. Then the sound of Cassidy’s gun splits the air, and the Arrow dives, rolling away from the hail of bullets. His bow swings up, an arrow goes, and the emergency light dies in a spray of sparks. Moments later, the bullet fire stops, and then there’s a pained yell._

_The man waits, draws his other knife._

_“That was a clever trick the other day,” he calls, walking back down the aisle, towards the door. “With the flash bang. I didn’t see it coming.”_

_“What do you want?” The Arrow’s between him and the door, his bow pointing at the man. The man keeps walking, dodges the arrow that comes at him carelessly._

_“I want what my employer wants.” The mercenary’s matter-of-fact. “Which I believe you have, now.”_

_“Why do they want it?”_

_“Do you really think I’m going to tell you?”_

_The Arrow’s hand shifts on the bow, and he growls out, “You will,” before he launches himself at the mercenary._

_The mercenary blocks the first blow, turns the bow aside. In the darkness, they’re just a duet of shadows, green and black blending into a blur of motion and steel and wood, the harsh smacks and their feet pounding the ground._

_“You’re good, kid.” The mercenary says, and sweeps his leg out, catching the Arrow’s legs. He stumbles, turns it into a roll backwards, then up to his feet on the other side of the table. The mercenary smiles, and vaults over it, and they close again, until once more the Arrow’s on the ground, and rolling away from the knife that stabs into the floor._

_“But you’re not going to beat me. I’m better.” The mercenary goes on. He lashes out with his knife, but it’s his boot that connects, right over the Arrow’s ribs, and the Arrow falls back. “Because you are a kid, aren’t you? Just a kid in a hood who thought he’d beat some bad guys.”_

_The Arrow is slowing visibly, falling back, but the mercenary keeps going, and his knife slices through the Arrow’s right arm. His hand twitches, opens; the bow falls from it, and the Arrow scrambles backwards, away. He grabs a beaker, throws it left-handed. It only slows the mercenary for a moment._

_“You’re still fighting on passion. You really believe in this shit, don’t you?” The mercenary shakes his head, and his fist clips the Arrow’s head, snapping it back. The Arrow stumbles and falls. The mercenary takes another beaker to the face, but he bats it away. “So you’re sloppy. It’s not the way to fight, hasn’t anyone told you that?” The knives drive down; one’s deflected by the Arrow’s arm, the other slices down, opens a gash on his neck—not pulsing, but red, even in the darkness._

_“You won’t win,” the Arrow hisses out, and the man shakes his head, smiling almost kindly._

_“You’ve got guts. And you’re better than anyone I’ve faced for a while, I’ll give you that.” He kicks out carelessly, and the Arrow makes an involuntary groan as it hits his ribs hard. The mecenary’s lips curl. “But you’re not better than me.”_

_“I—” The Arrow cries out, as the knife digs deep into his thigh._

_“I’ll take this, now.” The mercenary steps, casually, onto the Arrow’s arm, above the cut, and the Arrow screams as the mercenary picks a vial out of a pocket on his thigh. “I’m not going to kill you.”_

_“Why not?” The Arrow gasps out._

_“Where’d the fun be in that?” the mercenary smiles. “And anyway.” He taps at his headset. “My ride’s here.” He reaches down, pulls the knife out of the Arrow’s thigh, and blood follows it. “Better hope they don’t search this scene. Wouldn’t want them identifying that DNA.”_

_The Arrow’s left hand moves, suddenly, and then there’s an arrow in the mercenary’s hand, in his palm, and blood gushes out. “Or yours,” he spits, and the mercenary laughs._

_“Grow up, kid. You might be a real challenge then.” He pushes down, not gently, on the Arrow’s arm wound. “I’ll see you later.” He turns, and walks carefully out of the labs. The Arrow pushes himself up—then falls back, sagging hard against the table._

_\---_

“Zayn!” Louis’s on his feet when Zayn finally drags himself back to the house. He’s on fire everywhere, could barely hold on to his bike, even with the makeshift tourniquets he’d made himself. “You need to go to a hospital.”

“And tell them what?” Zayn steps off the bike, then limps up to the nearest table, levers himself onto it. This isn’t the worst he’s been hurt, he tells himself. It’s not the worst he’s been beaten. Fuck. Fucking hell. He’d been beaten, curbstomped. So fucking sloppy. Slade would be horrified. “Get me the first aid kit.”

“You need stitches.”

“You’re going to have to do it.” Zayn states, and slowly starts to peel the fabric away from his thigh. It didn’t hit anything vital, or he’d be dead by now. Sloppy of the mercenary. Sloppier of him to ever let him get the drop, to ever get in close. He’s always beaten Zayn in close.

“Yes, I figured.” Louis nods, then gets out the first aid kit, threads a needle with surprisingly sure hands. “I’ve been practicing,” Louis tells Zayn, smiling a little wryly at Zayn’s probably clear surprise. “Figured this would happen eventually.”

“Practicing?”

“On fruit, it’s what you’re supposed to do. Don’t look so shocked, I know I’m your only support. I figured that meant medical too.” Louis tugs the chair closer, sits down, and leans close to his thigh. “Okay. I’m starting. Don’t flinch or I’ll go all wrong.

“Just do it.” Zayn grabs an arrow to hold tight. Louis’s hand is surprisingly steady. Or maybe not surprising. He was always steady in a crisis. And he’s patched up innumerable siblings. At least he doesn’t faint at the sight of blood, then Zayn would really be screwed. More screwed than he is. They’d won, whoever they is. Whatever they’d gotten.

“Nadia’s searching for what the chemical is.” Louis’s voice is calm, soothing. Innumerable siblings, Zayn thinks, as the needle slides through his skin. He’s had worse. “You’re really lucky I hired someone who’s willing to do this at three in the morning. Though I’m not sure she was asleep. Computer people, they’re all night owls.”

“Are you distracting me?”

“I’m distracting myself from the fact that I’m giving my best friend stitches and could possibly kill him if I do it wrong,” Louis replies, sharp. “So. Nadia’s looking.”

Zayn’s hand tightens on the arrow despite himself, as Louis tugs too hard at the thread. “I need to know. Whatever it is, whatever he’s got—”

“She’s on it.”

“Something was wrong.” Zayn had been sloppy. No question. He’d been sloppy, letting the first men get out a call like that, then just—the whole fight. _Passion is good. Fighting with passion is good. But anger leads to carelessness. And carelessness leads to dead._ He’d been distracted. He couldn’t be distracted. He’d known starting everything with Harry was a bad idea, had known from the start that he couldn’t let people in, like that. That vulnerability only led to tears. Careless. Careless and sloppy. “It wasn’t—there should have been guards.”

“Maybe they took them out,” Louis suggests. Zayn shakes his head.

“The watch station was empty. And the alarms were off.” Zayn hisses in pain, as Louis finishes on his thigh. “Now my arm.”

Louis stares down at his handiwork. It’s crooked, and a little too loose, but it’s not bad. “Shit. Maybe I should put his on my resume.”

“Go ahead.” Zayn rolls his eyes, and turns his right arm over. “There—those sorts of chemical firms always have the latest alarm tech. Always. But there was nothing. Like it was turned off.”

“They could have deactivated it.”

“Yeah. But…” Zayn hums, closes his eyes as Louis starts with the wound on his arm. “It’s like with the bombs. There should have been more. It shouldn’t have been that easy. The police should have been there.”

Louis looks up. “You think there was a conspiracy?”

“I think that someone let them in.”

“An inside job?” Louis finishes with the stitches, then goes back to the first aid kit for a bandage.

“It’s the only thing that makes sense. Who—” Louis’s phone buzzes, and he sets down the bandage to look at it.

“Shit.”

“What?” Zayn demands, and hops off the table. He manages to land mainly on his left leg, but even his right can take weight now. He’ll be fine.

“Sit down.”

“Louis.”

“Sit down, or you’re not going to heal enough to deal with it.” Louis’s still looking at his phone. “She found it.”

“Tell me.” Zayn doesn’t sit. He can’t sit. Sitting would be giving in.

Louis’s voice is hoarse. “The building was the headquarters of MarbeX. It’s a biotech company, with government contracts. They were—they were developing a water-borne poison.”

“Poison?” Zayn repeats. “Water—” He lunges for the main table, as fast as he can limping. “Fuck, I know…” he pages through the papers the Bratva gave them, until he gets to plans for the camps, and spreads them over the table. “Look. I knew there was something weird about these. Here,” he explains, as Louis looks over his shoulder. “Look at the water pipes.”

“They’re weirdly complicated, sure, but—”

“They’re separate.” Zayn traces them, the ones with one pump, going to the guards’ quarters, the other to the residences. “This isn’t—I’ve been in prison camps. Adding an extra water pump isn’t necessary, it’s stupid, it’s another pressure point where someone can fuck something up. But if you’re planning to poison only the prisoners—”

Louis looks up at him, his jaw set, his face white. “And now they have the poison. And the camps are being built.”

Zayn stares at the plans. He could be in those camps. Innocent people could be. And Zayn could have stopped it, if he hadn’t been so sloppy and distracted.

His hand tightens on the edge of the table. His leg is aching, and it should. He should hurt for this. It will be nothing to how everyone else will hurt.

 ---

Zayn wakes to his phone ringing. He grabs it as he takes inventory of his body—aches and pains, the bruises setting in, the pulls of his wounds, but nothing he can’t move through. It’ll slow him down, that’s all.

“Yeah?” he answers.

“Turn on your TV. Any news station, I’ve got CNN,” Louis tells him, and Zayn gets up to do just that. Putting weight on his left leg isn’t impossible, and he can feel his arm working better. He’ll need to shoot on it a bit, get a feel for it, see how it affects his aim.

That’s all fine. The sloppy, what he’d done—that wasn’t. None of that was. How’s he supposed to fix anything if he can’t win? How’s he supposed to save anyone?

Zayn gets downstairs, turns on the TV as Rhino noses at his leg. He runs an absent hand over the dog’s head as he flips to CNN—and then his hand stops as he reads the banner at the bottom. TRUMP CALLING FOR VOTE ON MUSLIM INTERNMENT.

“So,” One of the anchors, a well-dressed white man with slicked back blonde hair, “why is Trump even doing this? He has to know it can’t pass, right? And it will certainly destroy any chances he has in the election.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure.” The other person on screen, a woman with her hair in tight curls around her face, answers. “While on the face of it it seems an absurd measure, remember this is the man who almost beat out Hillary Clinton for the presidency. His message resonates with a number of people.”

“But internment?” The male anchor seems as disbelieving as Zayn feels. “Isn’t that a step too far?”

“For the man who wanted to build a wall on the Mexican-American border?” The female anchor scoffs. “I don’t think anything is too far. And ISIS has plenty of Americans running scared.” She looks right at the camera. “Trump has a significant bloc of voters who support him, and remember, he has plenty of other connections where it counts.”

“You seeing this?” Louis asks, into his ear, as pictures of Trump pops up with various different people, all presumably very important. Zayn had forgotten he was there.

“Yeah,” Zayn hums.

“When asked about the legality,” the male anchor is saying, “Mr. Trump had this to say.”

“Legality? Let me tell you about legality!” Trump expounds from a podium. Next to him, as always, is that woman in the purple suit, smiling in satisfaction. “Is it legal that ISIS is still killing Americans? We can’t let that stand! Good Americans are dying and we aren’t doing anything! It’s time to take a stand. Time to show that we can hit back. That we take safety as our first concern, and rounding up the Muslims and showing them that we won’t let terrorists roam free is our first step. That’s how we’ll make American great again!”

It cuts back to the anchors. “All of our experts agree it wouldn’t be constitutional,” the male anchor points out.

“That’s for the courts to decide. It doesn’t mean it won’t pass the through the legislature, or that he can’t get the governor to sign it,” the female anchor points out. “He has his fingers in a lot of different pies, and that brings in influence. People like Corey Duberman, in construction, Henry Powell—the head of MarbeX biotech firm, Macy Caldwell, Brian Sherwin—he’s friends with a lot of players.”

“Zayn. We have to do something,” Louis’s saying, but Zayn’s ears are ringing, as he stares at the TV screen. He’s such—was he really such an idiot? “Zayn.”

“Shut up.” Zayn ignores the pain in his leg as he runs downstairs, where Charles’s notebook is sitting. Once, years ago, he’d had these names memorized, but that had been before so much. Before Fyers and Ivo, and all of this. He hadn’t—how hadn’t he connected this?

He flips through the notebook, scanning the list of names. And there they are. Henry Powell. Corey Duberman. Jenna Howard, head of SyOps. All the people mentioned on the TV. All of Trump’s cronies. All the people who killed Charles. Who made it easy to steal the bombs, the poison. Who are building the camps, and getting them passed.

“Louis,” he says, cutting off whatever Louis was saying. “Get over here, now.”

The bell rings twenty minutes later, and Zayn runs upstairs. He checks quickly—Louis, but he’s not alone.

Zayn yanks open the door. “What’s she doing here?” he demands.

“She showed up as I was leaving and wouldn’t let me get away,” Louis explains.

“Because I have things to say,” Nadia agrees. “You look horrible.”

“Thanks.”

“The bruises and all. I suppose it was a rough night last night, at MarbeX.”

“What?” Zayn asks. Nadia breezes past him, into the living room. She’s dressed as if for work, in flats and a dress that runs the line between appropriate and not, but her phone is out and she’s typing something on it. “Louis and I—”

“Need to hear what I have to say,” she interrupts. “I’m not stupid. We can cut all the stuff where you try to give me excuses about why Louis is asking me to look up proprietary information from a company that was broken into by the Arrow, and why I’m suddenly scheduling Louis’s life around some very late nights with you, and all that. You’re the Arrow.” Zayn opens his mouth to deny it, then shuts it again. There doesn’t seem to be much point. And she hasn’t leaked anything yet.

“What do you have?” he demands instead, and she smiles. It’s eerily reminiscent of Louis’s when he’s satisfied with something.

“The man who beat you.”

“Good. Wait a second.” Zayn holds up a hand, then, when she opens her mouth, he glares at her. “No, you wait a second. You’ve done a lot. But you don’t know everything.” She shuts her mouth. Louis makes an impressed sound. “It’s Trump. The conspiracy—they’re all on Charles’s list. They must be the people who can push through internment.” He grabs at his hair, then starts to pace. It hurts, but he needs to get used to working through that anyway. “And now they have the poison, so Trump’s calling for a vote. He has to be in control, the timing’s too good—”

“It’s not him.”

“I told you—”

“It’s not him,” Nadia interrupts. “Or maybe he knows, I don’t know. But, look.” She hands her phone to Zayn. Louis’s watching them with arms crossed, his eyes narrowed, but there’s something like a smile on his face.

Zayn looks at the screen. The mercenary’s face stares back at him. “Corbin Baker,” Nadia says, as Zayn reads. Maybe for Louis’s sake. “Special forces, dishonorably discharged. Been working as a mercenary ever since. Never arrested for anything, but suspected in dozens of murders and assaults. It took me a while, but I found where his last payment came from.” She pauses, until Zayn looks up. “Maude Waters.”

“Trump’s woman?” Louis echoes. He glances at the TV, which is still on. It’s the image of Trump again, and the woman in purple next to him. He points at her. “Her?”

“Her,” Nadia agrees. “It went through a bunch of puppet corporations, and it’s not her main account, or the Trump campaign account or anything, but—it ties back to her.”

“She’s trying to kill all the Muslims?” Louis stares at the screen. “She looks like she could be my mate’s mom.”

“So did Umbridge,” Nadia points out.

Louis snorts. “I knew I hired you for a reason.”

“Because I was bored and needed a day job?” she suggests. “Or because you’re turned on by women who boss you around?”

“And make Harry Potter references,” Louis pokes at her side. She doesn’t wince, just raises an eyebrow at him. So instead, he turns to Zayn. “So. It’s her. We’ve got three days until the vote. How do we stop her?”

Zayn stares at the TV. At the man on the podium, an American flag behind him, people cheering, the woman next to him. Somewhere there, the mercenary—Baker—is probably lurking. Able to take Zayn down. Especially now that he’s injured and slow. Sloppy.

“Zayn? Don’t we have a hunt?”

“A hunt for what?” Zayn snaps. “We don’t have real proof. It’s all circumstantial, and it all relies on the Arrow, which the police won’t accept. Even if they did, what do you want to bet that one of the names on this list is high up in the force?” Zayn shakes the notebook. “There’s nothing we can do. I can’t beat Baker, Trump has too much influence, and we’re done.”

He stalks out of the room. Somehow, he ends up at the side of the pool, sitting on one of the lounges, staring up at the LA sun. He’s felt powerless before. Tied up on the island. Watching Ivo slit Shado’s throat. For years in the band, caught between forces he couldn’t control, couldn’t influence. But now thousands of people will die, because he was slow and distracted and not enough. He’d thought the Arrow could change things, could do things that Zayn Malik never could, make things better. For him, for people like him. But he’d been stupid. Stupidly optimistic, like Louis had said he was. At least on the island, influence didn’t matter, the only thing that mattered was your wits and your force. Not here.

 _Predators don’t flinch. That’s how they become prey._ Well, Zayn had flinched, and he’s not a predator. He’s just a person, and he’s as lost as he’s ever been.

\---

“Are you sure you should be out?” Jeff asks. He has to lean in close, so that Harry can hear him over the music of the club.

Harry sighs. It’s the fifth time Jeff’s asked tonight. “Yes,” he replies, staunchly. Maybe he shouldn’t have told Jeff about the kidnapping, if it meant him trying to keep him inside all the time. Cooped up wasn’t good. Cooped up meant he would think about Zayn, about the Arrow, about the bit of video they’d had of the MarbeX break in of the Arrow limping out, apparently injured. Not dead, Harry’s traitor heart had beat, not dead not dead—but for how long? What had he been doing there?

Which is why Harry needs to be out, doing things. He needs excitement, needs a thrill. And a club is somewhere he can get it, all the people and dancing and how Harry can sink into the collective movement and excitement. Maybe smile at a pretty girl, see if she’ll let him take her home, or to the loos, because it might be sloppy but he needs distraction, needs not to think about Zayn. “I’ve got my bodyguards,” Harry tells Jeff, nodding in the direction of the two sober-faced men watching him. It’s unnerving, but Harry’s not going to be stupid about this. “I just needed to get out.”

“If you’re sure. Nowhere alone, right?”

“Nowhere,” Harry agrees. “Now come dance with me.”

Jeff makes a face, but next to him Glenne laughs, and lets Harry take her hand.

He spins her around, both of them being silly, knocking into people around them and not caring, until Jeff comes and steals her from him, wrapping his arms around her waist as she settles back against him. Harry watches them for a second, the intimacy, then turns away. That’s not what he wants. That’s always been too much, too crowded. He definitely doesn’t want it, not how he and Zayn had played at dancing once, laughing at each other at their clumsiness.

Instead, he finds a girl who seems to find his clumsiness and frankly subpar dancing charming—or maybe it’s his face, or the fact that she knows who he is, he doesn’t know and doesn’t much care. He’s not even drunk, he just needs this, needs the thrill, needs the chase. This is what he does. What he’s good at. Just giving enough, because giving too much is dangerous, giving too much is how you crack into pieces, how you end up listening to a voicemail and sobbing over it.

The bird brushes her long dark hair over her shoulders, grinds back against him with a coy smile. He smiles back, charming as he can be. He knows this game. He’s good at it. A bit of dancing, maybe he’ll buy her a drink, they’ll chat about nothing, and then he’ll take her home. It’s not cheating, he and Zayn weren’t anything. Not really. Zayn hadn’t let them be, because the Arrow was more important than Harry. Something was always more important than Harry to Zayn—the Arrow. The band. Perrie. Leaving.

No. Harry shuts those thoughts out, keeps moving to the music. He’s fine. Zayn made a choice and he respects that. He is just out here reacting appropriately.

The song ends, and she turns to smile at him again. Her makeup is a little smudged around her eyes, but there’s something charming about that, that little imperfection.  
“Megan!” She yells, as a new song starts.

“Harry.” He swallows. “Want a—” The words stick in his mouth. He’d get her a drink and take her home and—he doesn’t want that. He wants to want it, wants things to be easy, but he doesn’t want it. He wants to go home to Zayn and Rhino, even if it comes with Zayn’s nightmares. He wants to be twenty again, and take the chance he’d never dared when the opportunity was there.

“Thanks for the dance,” he says instead, and waves goodbye. Her brow furrows, but she shrugs and turns back to her girlfriends; he finds his way to the booth upstairs in the VIP section. Jeff and Glenne are back there, next to each other in one side of the booth.

“Okay?” Glenne asks.

Harry nods. “It was a good dance.”

“You sure you’re okay? There’s still so many people you haven’t talked to,” Glenne teases. _He’s not a womanizer_. _Don’t worry, I know the real you_. Harry takes another drink to clear his head.

“I’m surprised you two are back. There are so many nice stalls to—” Harry laughs as Jeff kicks at him.

“That’s enough from you,” he tells Harry. “I’m getting another round.”

“Thanks, babe!” Glenne pulls him in for a quick kiss before letting him go. Harry watches her watch him, the affection, the ease. It seems so boring. Except with Zayn…

He shakes his head. It doesn’t matter what it felt like with Zayn, how it hadn’t been boring. He can’t think about that. He’s busy, has plenty to do, and plenty to focus on. He doesn’t have to think about that.

\---

_Zayn’s on a hotel bed, one of the many interchangeable ones he’d spent his whole life in for years. It’s the beginning of On the Road Again, right at the edge of when it all got to be too much, and the bed is comfortable and he smiles, stretches as Harry comes out of the bedroom. He’s younger, like he looked then, his hair long and wild, and he throws himself onto the bed Zayn is on with an abandon he hadn’t had much, in later years. “Zayn,” he says, very seriously. “I think we should run away.”_

_“I wish.” Zayn laughs, maybe bitterly, his hand in Harry’s hair. This had happened, he thinks. He forgets where they were, but this had happened, or something like it. Maybe it had just happened so many times the specifics had blended together. “Where should we go?”_

_“Somewhere tropical. Somewhere warm.” Harry rolls, so he’s sitting on Zayn’s thighs, dimpling down at him. “Somewhere where we can be alone.”_

_“You’d get bored,” Zayn tucks a lock of hair behind Harry’s ear. He would. He’d run away in a heartbeat. He was a heartbeat away from leaving. Harry catches his hand, presses it to his cheek._

_“Not with you.”_

_“You get bored with everyone.”_

_Harry shakes his head, his hair hanging down around them, cutting them off from the world. “Never with you. So, Zayn.” He leans down, and it almost feels like he’s going to kiss Zayn, but that’s not what they did, not then; it was the constant game of chicken, of pressing close only for one of them to pull away, Zayn remembering his fiancée and the band and how close he was to breaking point and how he’d known Harry would break his heart, Harry for whatever reason. So Harry doesn’t kiss him, just lets his hair fall around them, and he’s smiling as he asks again. “Should we run away?”_

_Zayn looks up at him, meets his eyes, then it all melts away and they’re on the island, and Zayn has a bow in his hand and he’s looking at Ivo with a knife to Harry’s throat, smiling maniacally. “Him or you?” Ivo asks, and Zayn doesn’t have a voice, can’t say anything, can’t yell out “me me me just take me,” and Harry’s still smiling._

_“Should we run away?” Harry asks again, the knife pushing against his throat._

_“Me!” Zayn bursts out, and the noise is deafening, the sound of his voice, the word he can never say. “Me, take me, don’t hurt him.”_

_And Ivo smiles, still so cold, and then the knife is moving. “No.” And Shado’s body falls to the ground, her throat red, and Zay can only stare, because he’d said to take him, he’d chosen him, he’d wanted to save her but he couldn’t, he hadn’t._

_“Oh, well done, Zayn.” There’s Charles, suddenly, pacing around him. Blood drips from the wound in his head, but he’s leafing through the notebook. “Couldn’t even save one girl. How are you supposed to save a city? How are you supposed to pick up my mission?”_

_“He wouldn’t,” Slade says, and Zayn whirls and there’s Slade, not the Slade who had died but the one Zayn had first known, who had saved him and trained him and who had loved Zayn, who Zayn had loved. “Selfish bastard. He’d rather save himself.”_

_“Can’t do anything right,” Charles adds. “Can’t—”_

_“Zayn.” There are hands on his face, cupping them, and Zayn’s looking into Harry’s face again, an older Harry, the one who had kissed him, the one who had looked at his scars and hadn’t flinched. “Let’s run away.” He kisses Zayn, and there’s no blood, no Charles or Slade or Shado, just Harry, and when it stops Zayn is back on that hotel bed, Harry on top of him. “Zayn,” Harry says, one more time. “Are you going to run away?”_

He wakes up with those words still echoing in his ears. There’s a thrumming in his veins like he’d been awakened on the island by a stray noise, but there’s no threat there. Rhino’s still fast asleep, no alarms have gone off. This isn’t the island; he has security systems, the best money can buy.

But the adrenaline’s still there, so he gets up. He doesn’t know how long he slept, but it can’t have been long—looking at his phone, it’s barely two. He hadn’t gone out tonight, so he’d gotten to sleep at a reasonable time; three hours of sleep is plenty.

He hadn’t gone out because he’s injured, he tells himself, leaving his bedroom. Injured. He’s not running away, no matter what the echo of Harry’s voice is telling him. He’s injured, he couldn’t do anyone any good. Can’t stop anything.

Zayn wanders down the halls without turning on any lights. It’s still brighter than it usually was on the island, the city light seeping in despite the sweep of the property. But just in moonlight, the halls themselves feel distant, ghostly. Like Zayn’s a ghost.

He is a ghost here, in so many ways. He’s a ghost, and the boy he used to be is there too, haunting ever step. Harry wants him to be that boy. Broken, but a version of that boy.

That boy had bought this house. Zayn still likes it, still remembers the way he’d walked through it that first time. It’s not the first house he’d bought, not the first house he’d bought for himself, but something about this had been different, cut loose from the band, from everything he’d ever known. Drifting a little. Knowing what he didn’t want, not sure if he could get what he did. This house had been a statement then. A place that was his, that was Zayn Malik’s, not Zayn of One Direction’s, not Trisha and Yaser’s son or that Muslim kid or even ZAYN’s, as he’d been thinking about calling himself. Just—his.

And there’d been refuge in that. Refuge in these walls, in the paint he’d flung onto them. He doesn’t want to paint now, knows there’s no solace in that. No solace from the ache in his thigh, his arm. The ache that means he’s failed. That means he’s lost again, drifting.

Somehow, his feet lead him to the studio. No one’s stepped foot in here for years, probably, other than whoever aired the house out before he got back. Everything’s left like it was when he left for London, before he took that plane. The instruments, the systems. He doesn’t remember the song he was working on. Maybe they’d finished it, put it on the album.

He sits down on a stool, swivels it around. He’d spent so much time here that summer. Well, first in Naughty Boy’s studio, before that had fallen through so spectacularly, but in studios. In rooms like this, figuring out who he was, without One Direction. Who he wanted to be. Before all that changed, and who he wanted to be couldn’t be who he was.

_Are you going to run away?_

He’s not running. He’s never run. Slade had laughed at that, had clapped him on the back the first time he’d held his ground. It was one of the first times he’d impressed him. Had proved he could survive, that he had a predator in him too. Zayn doesn’t run, doesn’t avoid. That’s never changed. Even when he last sat here, in this room, he hadn’t been running. He’d left the band. But that hadn’t been running. Or it had been running to, not from. To—something more. Something that could do more. That was saying what he wanted to say, doing what he wanted to do.

He can’t do anything now. Zayn looks around the recording studio, all this equipment, all these dreams. The dreams Harry still wants him to have. That everyone still wants him to have. But he’s not ZAYN. He’s not Zayn of One Direction. He’s barely even Trisha and Yasser’s son. He’s just—Zayn Malik. And who is that to stand against a conspiracy of the might of the one he’s facing?

 _What resources do you have?_ It doesn’t matter, he would tell Slade, if he could. _Nothing doesn’t matter, boy. We use what we have, and we make do. What do you have?_

A hurt leg, a hurt arm. A bow with no one to shoot. A hacker girl with a smart mouth, a popstar with a smart mouth. No proof that’s remotely admissible.

Duberman was right. Even if he had recorded their conversation, what would he do? He can’t give it to the cops. He can’t do anything with it.

_What do we have, boy? There’s always something. Even if it’s a tree branch, you can hit a man over the head with a branch, then you have his gear. What do we have?_

Nothing. An old recording studio. A man he loves who hates him.

 _Slade will always tell you to punch._ Shado now, more ghosts to haunt him. _He is large, he can do that. You and me? We weave. We find the unconventional path. We shoot the arrow where the tree is weakest. So first—we find the weakness._

What’s Maude Waters’ weakness, or Trump’s? Too much money? Too many connections? A presidential bid? What is Zayn supposed to do against that, when half the population almost elected him president, and half thinks he’s a buffoon? How’s he supposed to change things?

_What do you have, boy?_

A hurt leg. A hurt arm. A bow and no one to shoot. Ghosts of those he’s failed.

 _They’ll listen to you_. Charles’s frantic voice. _You can tell people. They’ll listen to you._

_We find the weakness._

_What do you have, boy?_

_Are you going to run away?_

So many ghosts. So many voices. So many people.

People. This isn’t the island. The battle isn’t won here by an arrow to the throat. The battle is won in an elected body. The battle is won when people know. This battle is won when people care, and change the course.

Zayn bolts up, goes downstairs. He ignores the pain, pulls on the hood, picks up the bow.

 _What do you have, boy_?

A hurt leg. A hurt arm. A recording device.

\---

_There’s no moonlight in the office. No light except the slivers that comes from the streetlights far down below them, from the emergency light in the hall outside. The furniture is all shadows, the pictures on the wall bits of darker shadows against the white walls._

_The figure slipping through the window is yet another shadow. It moves around the furniture like it doesn’t need light to see, around the cabinet with the flowered teaset displayed on it, around the whiteboard with its manic scribbles, around the overstuffed polka dotted armchair. The Arrow avoids all of those with sure feet, then ducks under the desk, pushes something against the wood. He picks up the phone sitting just a bit off its receiver, presses something into it too._

_He takes one look around the office, the TRUMP FOR PRESIDENT poster that’s strung across the back bookshelves, the cat figurines sitting on the shelves._

_Then he smiles, and slips back out._

 ---

_“No, that wasn’t the deal. We said five hundred! You can’t just change it on us, now we have to go back to the party—”_

_“What do you mean, he’s out with her! That’s not—he can’t keep doing this, what will it do for their relationship! It’s already so hard for those poor boys…we’ll find a way to tell him. Stay on him.”_

_“Yes, sir, of course, we’ll make sure to rearrange the schedule. Don’t you worry, Mr. Trump. We’re handling everything.”_

" _Hi, yes, it’s Maude Waters, just calling to update you. Duberman has the MarbeX chemicals, yes…I agree, the bombs would have been more dramatic, but unfortunately that wasn’t in the cards anymore—no, it won’t affect the timing, the poison is very fast acting, and painful I hear.” There’s a bit of glee in her voice there, badly hidden. “It’ll be clear what happened to them wasn’t an accident…yes, we’ve actually tested it, I told you. It’ll be perfect for when the camps are made. We’ll get all those filthy Muslim terrorists in there within a week of Donald getting the law passed and Duberman finishing them, then a week more and they’ll be dead.” She lays it out like a laundry list. “Might even get that bitch in the white house to take a firmer stance on how these terrorists can get into America….no, Donald’s best not knowing, not until it’s passed; I don’t want him having to lie. That’s my job….yes, ma’am. We’ll all be safe soon.” She lets out a long, relieved breath. “America will be safe."_  

Louis takes off his headphones, looks at Zayn, and his smile is fierce, triumphant. Zayn suspects he’s looking similarly. “We got her.”

\---

Harry senses Zayn before he sees him. Or maybe Zayn did that on purpose, made Harry notice him. Harry can’t help but think where they are is purposeful, at least. He’s alone, all the people he’d been working with on the writing gone out. Maybe Zayn knows he won’t say anything too loudly, in a public place. Maybe he didn’t want to sneak into Harry’s house again. Maybe, Harry has to admit, he didn’t want to intrude on Harry’s space.

Whatever reason, Harry stays looking at his computer, keeping his back to Zayn. He doesn’t want to hear him. Doesn’t want to see him. If he sees him—god, Harry misses him. But how much more would he miss him, if he died for real? If he got up from Harry’s bed, went out there, and got killed?

With that thought, Harry pushes a button on his computer, deliberately.

“I’m not going to apologize.” There are no more footsteps; Zayn must have stopped. “I’m not the kid I was when we were twenty and pretending there was nothing between us. Nothing will make me that person again. I don’t even necessarily want to be him again.”

Harry blinks, still looking at his computer, even though he doesn’t think he can see the screen. He forgets what he was doing. What song he was writing. It doesn’t matter, probably.

“And if that’s not something you can deal with, then that’s fine—or, like, it sucks. But I get it. I’m broken, and I’m dangerous, and leaving me would probably be the smart thing to do, even if it would break my heart.”

Harry gives up on keeping his eyes open, just squeezes them shut, squeezes his fingers on the mouse. Why do the acoustics of this room have to be so good? Why does he have to hear every solid syllable in Zayn’s voice, that horrible, beautiful, terrifying surety? He hadn’t been thinking about it. He’d been fine, doing other things.

“I know you wish I’d give it up, but I’m not going to. I can’t. If there’s one thing the island taught me, it’s to figure out what’s important, and what’s the most important. You’re important. What we have—what we had—that’s important. But, like. This is more important. This is a mission. My mission.” Zayn swallows, and his voice quavers for the first time. “I thought maybe you’d have understood that, got what the Arrow was doing, but maybe I was wrong. Maybe I expected too much of you, I guess I do that.”

He walks forward, and Harry flinches, thinking he’s going to touch Harry. He might break if that happens. Might crack into a thousand pieces. This is what he never wanted. He never wanted to break like this. Never wanted anyone to hurt him like this. Never wanted anything to hurt him like this.

But instead, Zayn puts something on the table next to Harry. He gets a view of a Zayn’s hand, the dove and the lips and the callouses, the fingers he’s traced, fingers he’s loved. Zayn’s breath is on his neck for a second, his body so close—then it’s gone.

“If you don’t want this, us, you don’t want it. But I need you—I’m asking you—to do something. The Arrow is asking. If you decide you believe in the Arrow, whether or not you believe in me.” It’s a flash drive, the thing on the table. “I need you to post this to twitter. To tell everyone the Arrow gave it to you.”

Harry twitches. That’s not—he’s not—he’s spoken for the Arrow, said shit on camera, but this is different.

“I know this isn’t what you do, shit like this on twitter. But people have to know. And you’re the one they’ll listen to.” He can hear Zayn shift. “If you don’t do it, you don’t do it, and we get it out another way. But this would be best. If you want to.” Zayn sucks in a breath. “Listen to it. Please. Then choose.”

His footsteps are retreating now, back towards the door. Harry’s shaking. He wonders when that started.

“And Harry—” Zayn’s voice breaks again, just a bit. His heart’s always been in his eyes, his voice, his face. In every bit of him. Harry was never like that. Harry never could be. Could never risk that. “No matter what you choose, I’ll never let you fall.”

Then the footsteps go, go, go, and there’s the sound of the door closing.

Harry takes a deep, shaky breath. Listening to it is the least he can do, he figures. For Zayn, for the Arrow. He won’t post it or anything, but he can listen. If Zayn swallowed his pride enough to come. Like he did to call, and then he died. Zayn says the Arrow’s more important, but Harry’s heart has broken once. What does he know about importance? What could be worth Zayn’s life?

He’d spoken for the Arrow, yes. He believes in what he’s doing. But Zayn’s life. But Harry’s heart. If he doesn’t choose, it can’t break, not fully.

Harry plugs in the flash drive, listens. His hand convulses on the mouse as he does, his breath caught in his throat until it’s over. He listens to it once, then again, then takes a breath.

And chooses.


	12. Chapter 11

_INTERMENT PLANS BLOWN APART: SECRET GENOCIDE CONSPIRACY REVEALED, TRUMP AT CENTER_

_“Spread from, out of all places, Harry Styles’s twitter account—yes, Harry Styles, of One Direction, the tweet “The Arrow gave me this. Thought all of you deserved to hear. All the love, H” went viral within minutes. This incriminating recording is backed up by anonymous evidence emailed to, we’re told, the LA Chief of Police, the mayor, and the governor’s office, including a list allegedly naming the conspirators. This conspiracy included a far reaching network of wealthy businesspeople in all industries, though some claim ignorance of the full scope of the plan…”_

_TRUMP TRUMPED: BUSINESS MOGUL ARRESTED, CLAIMS IGNORANCE_

_THE ARROW HAILED AS SAVIOR BY CITIZENS_

_THE FULL SCOPE OF ISLAMAPHOBIA: OUT OF FEAR, MASS MURDER_

_MASTERMIND ON THE LOOSE: MAUDE WATERS STILL NOT FOUND_

_\---_

“So I wasn’t planning on giving this interview, but you’re a bit of a hero now.” James pats his leg, smiling like a proud brother. Harry grins back, ducking his head with the proper amount of coyness. “Hero to me too, doing that the day before you go on my show. Very considerate of you.”

“You know I always plan my life around your ratings,” he agrees, and James chuckles.

“Your life, the life of thousands of others. That was a massive tweet.”

“But not actually my most popular,” Harry informs him. The lights are hot on his face, and he feels…fidgety. It’s been almost twenty-four hours since he posted that tweet, he’s talked to police and pointedly not talked to reporters, and he hasn’t seen Zayn. Hasn’t heard tell of him, of him or the Arrow. He’s still not sure what he’ll do, if he does talk to him. He’d chosen—but that hadn’t been Zayn. That had been the Arrow.

And he had chosen. Harry takes a breath. “But all jokes aside—I’m not the hero here. I pushed a button. The Arrow is the one who, at great risk to his life, discovered this plot, and brought it to light. I’m simply proud I could be part of it.”

“Risk to his life? Is the Arrow injured?” James asks. His face is genial, but it always is. Harry’s been caught by that before. “Seems like a bit of a bad rap, save the world—or LA—then get hurt. Stub his toe?”

“Something like that. Nothing to worry about.” Harry looks straight into the camera. “He managed to take down a massive conspiracy wounded, I’m sure he’ll be back on the streets.”

“You’re definitely the only person we know of—where we is me and my google search—who has actually talked to him. What does that make you? His PR director?”

Harry laughs, as he’s supposed to, but he keeps his eyes on the camera. Maybe Zayn will be listening. “Something like that, I guess. It’s not like he can speak for himself. Someone has to.”

“And that someone is you?”

He’s chosen. It feels…odd. To choose, to believe. Is this what Zayn feels like, all the time? So heavy with purpose? If he does, it’s no wonder he’d always been so moody. No wonder he’d needed Harry to pull him out of it, to remind him that not everything is the whole world.

But this… Harry tosses his hair back, gives his most disarming, dimpling smile. “It would seem so.”

“Aren’t you afraid that will make you a target?”

“Of all the supervillains around?” Harry snorts, waves a dismissive hand. “That’s what bodyguards are for. And anyway.” Maybe Zayn will hear this. Maybe he won’t. Harry finds it doesn’t matter. “That’s not what’s important.”

“Well, that’s a lot heavier than I expected.” James turns to the camera. “When we come back, Harry will be joined by the rest of One Direction to talk about their forthcoming album. Harry, thanks for speaking to us on your own! I know that wasn’t in the schedule, but we couldn’t pass this up.”

“As I said, my life is at the beck and call of your ratings,” Harry tells him, and keeps smiling until the director calls that they’re off.

“But really,” James says, as they get up, and one of the PAs comes over to give him a glass of water. “Thanks, mate. I know you’ve been talking about this all day.”

“I get it. Just hope whoever you booted out for me to come in isn’t mad.”

“I’ll deal with them.” James pats his arm. “Seriously, take care of yourself.”

“Always do. I’ll go get the boys.”

“Break’s over in five,” James calls after him, and Harry shoots him a thumbs up.

He’d gotten here before the rest of the boys, so he hasn’t seen them yet today. Liam hits him immediately with a hug, a tight solid squeeze, then something that’s half scolding for being so reckless—which Harry thinks is pretty rich coming from someone with Liam’s history with twitter, but he doesn’t point that out—and half praise; Niall tells him he’s an idiot, but keeps reporting new headlines with a barely contained grin. Louis just grabs his arm, pulls him into a tight hug when Liam lets go.

“Thank you,” he whispers into Harry’s ear, as he’s letting go. “Welcome to the team.” Harry can only nod. The team.

“You know,” Liam says, as they’re being herded towards the stage. “When I told you to settle down, this wasn’t what I was thinking of.”

Harry grins, crosses his legs so that they’re all nicely pressed up against each other. “Come on, Liam. I couldn’t do anything boring, could I?”

The interview goes well, then they perform a song, and it still feels just as good, that adrenaline rush. Still feels just as important, just as engulfing. There’s still no thrill quite like it. But maybe there are other thrills too. Other important ones.

Harry bids goodbye to the other boys at the door, all of them splitting off to their own cars. Harry follows his bodyguards into his car, telling the driver to take him home. It’s funny. It’s barely been a day since he was sitting in that studio, recording, trying not to think about Zayn or the Arrow. Now—now apparently he’s the Arrow’s mouth.

Which is an odd thing to say, and just makes him think about Zayn’s mouth. Zayn, and his mouth, and all of him. He’s still thinking of Zayn when he gets out of the car, waves goodbye to the bodyguards. He’s still thinking of him when the hand covers his mouth, and he inhales, and it all goes black.

\---

“Harry. Harry. _Harry_.”

“Piss off.”

“Harry, wake the hell up, right now.”

Harry blinks. His head aches, like a really bad hangover, the kind he hasn’t had for years. And he’s…not in his bed. He’s sitting up. And his hands are tied.

“Harry,” Louis repeats, and Harry blinks again, trying to focus.

“Louis? Is this the fun kind of tied up?”

“If it was the fun kind, why would I be here?” Louis snaps. Somehow, the snapping is helping ground Harry, drive away the ache in his head. That’s normal. Louis snapping at Harry is normal. “Harry. Wake up. Please.”

“m awake.” Harry blinks again. The room is starting to focus—and he immediately wishes it hadn’t. It’s a warehouse, he thinks; some big open room with cement floors and concrete walls and a lot of pipes and metal. It’s not a comforting room. Though the chair he’s tied to isn’t uncomfortable; a sort of dining room chair upholstered in a floral pattern. Next to him, Louis is tied with his arms behind his back to what looks like a matching chair. They’re incongruous in the industrial room, as is the table in front of them, and the third chair in the set, facing them. “What—”

“I don’t know. I got—I think I was on my way home?” Louis shakes his head.

“Freddie?” Harry demands.

“Still with Brianna, as far as I know.” Louis looks around again, swears. “Thank god for that at least.”

“Is this—why?” Harry manages to focus on Louis. His vision’s almost back. He was kidnapped. He was kidnapped, and there’s no Zayn here to save him. Zayn’s not even speaking to him. Zayn probably doesn’t know he was taken. Zayn will come. “Does this have to do with—”

“We don’t think so. Or, yes, but not because of what you did,” Louis’s muttering fast, under his breath, his gaze flicking around. “It’s been happening long—”

“Oh good, you’re awake. I was worried Corbin had given you too much, but you’re stronger than you look, aren’t you?” Carrying a floral teapot, a short woman in a purple suit walks in, closing the door she had come through behind her.

Maude Waters shuffles through the room, her loafers almost soundless against the floor. “You’d have to be, the things you’ve been through.”

“Like being kidnapped?” Louis spits, and Maude laughs. It’s higher pitched than Harry’d pictured, from a woman who’d plotted to kill thousands.

“You’re just as funny in person. No, I was talking about all the lies you’ve had to tell. All the situations you’ve been forced into. All the abuse your management has put you through.”

Louis’s groan is probably only audible to Harry. Harry manages not to, but he almost laughs, it’s so ridiculous. This stupid thing, still chasing them, a full decade later. Getting them kidnapped.

“It’s criminal,” Maude tsks, and sets the tray down on the table. There are three cups. “What they’ve done to keep you two apart. And then you,” she give Harry a stern look. “Going about with that Jenner girl, even after you’d finally dropped your beard. Don’t you know what you’re doing to him?”

“Yeah, Harry. Don’t you know what you’re doing to me?” Harry ignores Louis and his badly timed sarcasm.

“You’re the one who’s been attacking us?”

“Attacking? Oh, no.” She laughs again, and leans over to pour her tea. In the corner, the door opens again, and someone else slips in—the scarred man, from the alley. From the last time he’d tried to kidnap Harry.

Deep breath. Harry’s okay. He’s not going to be the damsel in distress, because who knows when Zayn will come. Calm under pressure. He can panic later.

“No, I’ve just been trying to get you safe. To get everyone safe!” Her voice rises on the last words, almost to a shriek. Then she smiles, Stepford sweet. “Sugar?”

“The Arrow’s going to come,” Harry announces. The cold-eyed man looks up at that. “He’ll rescue us.”

“It’s not a rescue, dear. I know what management has been telling you, but this is a safe space, dearie. Your love is free here. I know, you know. Corbin knows. You’re safe. You can finally have the life you’ve always planned together.” She pats his hand, and Harry shivers. “Now, the sugar?”

“No—” Louis’s foot goes into his leg, hard. Harry turns to glare; Louis’s nodding. “Yes? Um, three please.”

“Such a good boy.” She gives him a fond smile that makes him want to take a long hot shower, and bends over to do it.

Louis tips into him the moment she does. “Keep her talking.”

“Why?”

“Because—”

“Oh!” Maude claps her hands delightedly. “Oh, good, you’ve realized. I’m so sorry we don’t have better seating, but a safehouse just isn’t what it used to be, right? And I think you’re a little big for one chair now.”

Louis tips himself back upright, sends Harry a look. Keep her talking. Okay. Keep her talking while Louis…does something with his hands, apparently.

It doesn’t matter. Harry needs to keep her talking, because Zayn is going to come, and he’ll keep her here until that happens.

“The tea looks lovely,” he tells her. “I love that teapot—the florals.”

“Isn’t it? It was my grandmother’s. I thought you might appreciate it. Sugar for you, Louis?”

“No,” Louis snaps. His face is red, either from effort or from trying not to provoke her, Harry’s not sure.

“He’s, um. Sweet enough already?” Harry tries. It falls awkwardly off his tongue, but he tries a smile instead. Humor her. Keep her talking. Zayn will come.

“Awwww,” she coos. “So sweet, you are. Ten years later and still going strong, it’s lovely, you know? Even with everything you’ve faced.”

“You’ve been hiding out here, then?” Harry asks. He wonders if it occurs to her that it was him who spread the word that incriminated her. “You’ve done wonders with the place.”

“Oh, it’s not permanent. Just a bit of a temporary situation until I can get to the Caymans. I had to move faster than I expected, after you sent that out.” Harry winces, but she pats his hand, pushes a tea cup towards him. “I don’t blame you honey, don’t worry. I know the Arrow threatened you. Used you. You were just trying to save yourself, I get that.”

“Thank you.” Harry smiles at her. It almost hurts. But this is what he can do. Zayn is coming. Zayn has to be coming. He refuses to let the last thing he said to Zayn be in anger.

“It’s all that Arrow’s fault. Dragging you into it. Foiling me. Keeping you two away from me.”

“What are you going to do with us?” Harry asks. He’s not sure he wants to know. But Louis’s still concentrating very hard doing something, and the cold eyed man is watching him like he knows what’s happening, and Zayn said he’d keep him safe, and Harry believes him, the Arrow and Zayn both. Harry chose.

“Well, I was going to make sure you were all right with each other. I know Zayn coming back threw a new wrench in things. I don’t know where management pulled him out of.” She wrinkles her nose. “First he destroys your coming out narrative, then he does it again with his disappearing act. Then just when you’re ready, he comes back and you two are forced to spend time with him again!” She hums. “I wonder, really, if that was all management. He comes back just as the terrorist attacks step up? That seems too coincidental to be true.”

Harry bites down on his protest. “And now?” he asks, instead. “Now what?”

She blinks, her eyes wide and clear. “I’ve got you safe,” she repeats. “I couldn’t save everyone, but you two will be safe. You’re in love. You will be forever. You’ll be safe. You’ll come with me and we can all be safe and happy together. I’ll keep you safe.”

“And Louis’s son?” Harry asks, for something to say. He wills his heart to slow down. Calm. He can be calm, he can do this. Zayn will come.

“I’m sure management will still pay the actor, don’t worry.” Louis jolts, hisses. This time it’s Harry who kicks him. “We just have to wait for the ship to come, and then we can all go off together, and no one who wants to hurt us can find us.”

She leans closer, and for a second Harry thinks she’s going to kiss him, but instead she just holds the teacup to his lips. “Tea?”

Harry swallows. Zayn will come. He’ll see him again. He has to.

\---

Nadia pushes through the door as soon as Zayn opens it, but she’s moving faster than a few days ago, when she’d been all easy confidence. Now she’s jerky. Scared.

“Come in,” Zayn says before he can stop himself, and shuts the door. The instant it’s closed, Nadia spins, and her face is pale. She’s just in jeans and a t-shirt, her hair pulled back messily.

“I can’t find Louis.”

“What?”

“He was supposed to check in after the interview, I had something else, I couldn’t be there, but we had to coordinate this evening. He didn’t call.”

“Maybe he just didn’t—”

“After an hour of him not returning my calls, I tracked his GPS,” Nadia rolls over him. She’s pacing, her hands twitching in a way Zayn recognizes, though it’s probably for a computer rather than a bow. “I found his phone. Outside his house. Without him there.”

Zayn’s head jerks up. “Abandoned?”

“Thrown, it looked like. In the bushes.”

“Freddie?”

“At his mother’s.” Zayn lets out a breath. He’d thought this was done, he’d been stupid, careless. They’d had no proof this was connected, and he’d seen the news. There were still people at large. The police hadn’t rounded everyone up yet. “We need—”

“That’s not all,” Nadia interrupts him again. “As soon as I saw Louis was gone, I checked on the other band members. Because of all the shit that’s been going on. And Zayn, Harry didn’t answer his phone. And GPS puts it just outside his house.”

Zayn reels back. Harry. Harry didn’t answer his phone. Harry doesn’t abandon his phone. Harry isn’t—he did this. He put Harry in danger. And now Harry could be— _Shado’s throat, red with blood. Slade with an arrow in his eye._

“Find them,” he hisses. He can’t—this wasn’t supposed to happen. This was never supposed to happen. He’d been supposed to keep Harry safe, to keep both of them safe, had sworn to, but of course he couldn’t, of course he’d failed. When had he ever kept someone he cared about safe?

“I’m trying!” Nadia yells, her hands in the air. Rhino barks, sharp and urgent. “They don’t have phones, they don’t have anything electronic on them, what am I supposed to do?”

“Nadia.” Zayn grabs her shoulders. If it’s as much to steady him as to steady her, she doesn’t have to know. “I can’t—it would take me too long. You have to do this. Look for connections with the mercenary, Corbin Baker. He attacked Harry too, they’re probably connected. And—Louis might have the comms on him. Can you track those?”

“No, there’s no GPS, I didn’t know—I thought Louis was just fooling around then, I didn’t realize what they were for.” Her teeth are digging into her lip, but he can feel her breathing slowing, can see her start thinking. He needs her thinking. He needs her clear headed, because he’s not sure he is. Because he can feel his hands wanting to shake, can feel something waiting to crash over him. Harry. Fuck, Harry. “I can—yeah. I’ll. Do you have a computer?”

“Downstairs.” Zayn doesn’t think when he lets her in, brings her downstairs. He probably should. Should probably vet her, figure out if he can trust her, but she is the one person who can help him save Harry and Louis and he doesn’t give a fuck what else happens. He’s not going to fail another person he loves.

He as good as shoves the computer at Nadia, and he can see as she dives in, focusing, her fingers moving. Zayn grabs his leathers, starts pulling them on. He needs to go. He needs to help. He can’t—

_If you weren’t so selfish, none of this would have happened._

If he hadn’t talked to Harry, that first time, as the Arrow. If he hadn’t sucked him in. If he hadn’t put him in danger—

He grabs his bow, turns to the dummies. His arm hurts, his leg hurts, and he ruthlessly pushes that away.

“Zayn!” Nadia calls, and Zayn turns.

“You have—”

“No. But I was checking the comms, in case there was GPS I forgot about, and—listen.” She pushes some buttons, and then a low static fills the room. A low static, undercut by sharp taps, like someone hitting a speaker, in a rhythm.

“What’s that?”

“I ran it through morse code, it’s nothing. But it’s definitely deliberate. That’s a signal.”

Zayn listens again. He can’t—“That’s a bassline,” he says, running his hands through his hair. “That’s, I think it’s—I don’t know, one of the old songs, I can’t think.”

“Definitely a signal.” Nadia grins. “Zayn. Louis’s okay enough to signal.”

“You don’t have to be very okay for that.” Zayn touches his back, where the whip left scars. “And we don’t know about Harry. I’m going to the Bratva, see if they know anything. You—find them.”

“The Bratva—”

“Nadia,” Zayn growls, already halfway to his bike. “Find them.”

It’s barely sunset, and everyone can probably see him as he zooms past, but he doesn’t care. He needs to do something. He needs to stop seeing Shado’s red red throat, stop seeing that on Harry, _I would have chosen me I chose me you should have taken me!_

_Zayn?_ in Slade’s voice, that last broken moment, when he’d almost been himself, before love and the mirakuru madness had remade him. That voice, and his blood on Zayn’s hand, the water rising on the ship—

_They’ll listen to you_ and then the bang of the gun, Charles’s blood on Zayn, the panic, the first casualty, and they had listened to Zayn and now it’s done and the man he loves is somewhere out there hurt and Zayn had known this would happen, _you betray everyone you love you selfish bastard you’re so fucking selfish_ dangerous dangerous dangerous—

Zayn skids to a halt, pulls away, and leans over the front of his bike, breathing heavily, feeling it scrape over his throat.

_Shado’s hands, gentle over his shoulders, guiding as he draws his bow. Shado’s final gasping breath, the way her eyes had locked with Zayn’s in a final admonition._

_Slade’s sudden, surprised grin, when Zayn appeared when he thought himself abandoned. Slade with his hand on Zayn’s face, condemning to the last._

_His mother’s joyful tears, seeing the house he bought for her. His father’s gasping relief as he clung to Zayn, finally come home._

_Four boys hugging under the tropical sun, jumping for joy at a single yes. Calls going unanswered, after a choice he couldn’t regret._

_Harry’s smile as he kissed Zayn, like there was nowhere else he’d rather be._

Zayn lifts his head, sets his shoulders. He has too many ghosts. He’s not getting more. Anyone who stands in his way won’t have a chance. And if they’re hurt, he will make good on his threats, and it’ll be him who will burn this city to the ground.

“Zayn.” Nadia’s voice is in his ear. “I’ve got them.”

\---

Zayn has to crawl on top of some shipping containers to see inside the warehouse windows, but he’s glad. It gives him better vantage. The high ground. Waters chose a place with the best position he could be in, as an archer.

“It was bought through the same account that paid Baker,” Nadia had told him, on the rushed ride over, when he could hear her over the skidding of his tires as he took turns, over the wind in his ears. “I think it’s probably the safehouse where she was hiding. But the electricity use suddenly went up a few hours after Harry’s tweet went out, and there’s come CCTV of a van…”

Nadia’s quiet now, which is better than Louis usually is, and it lets Zayn concentrate as he edges closer on his stomach, his bow in front of him, ready to be drawn.

Inside, it’s almost bare. No cover, just an empty warehouse, some scaffolding around the sides. In one corner, Baker’s sitting on a wood chair, watching with one of his knives drawn. And in the center—

“They’re here,” Zayn breathes out, for Nadia’s benefit, but maybe for his own, too, because his heart is beating again. In the center of the warehouse, are three chairs, and sitting on two of them are Harry and Louis, and they’re both moving. Both moving. Both okay.

Well then. Maybe only this building will burn.

The windows are actually well-oiled, as he eases it open. Whatever’s happening in the middle of the room must be distracting, because Baker doesn’t look up, doesn’t look away from where they’re talking, Harry and Waters. Zayn can’t hear it, as he circles for the best angle. Baker is the danger here, but—

“What do you mean, you won’t go!” Waters’ voice rises into a shriek. “You can come with me and be together! What’s more important than that?”

“I meant—” Harry says, slow and placating, but her hand rises and falls, and the crack of a palm against flesh rings in the room, Harry’s head snapping back.

The arrow is there before Zayn can think, smashing the teapot into a thousand pieces. Waters squeals, and Baker’s on his feet as Zayn throws himself in, landing with his bow already in hand.

“The next arrow goes in your eye,” he growls, and Waters screams.

“Corbin!”

Zayn pivots as the mercenary charges. There’s no preamble this time, just a knife flying at him and Zayn dodges, swings out with his bow. He has Harry and Louis in his periphery but he can’t focus on them, not when Baker is there, big and strong and skilled and he’s beaten Zayn so many times before, the most anyone’s beaten him since Slade.

“I’m just going to beat you again, kid,” Baker tells him, as Zayn catches his arm on his bow, turns the strike aside, then jams his leg into Baker’s ribs only to have it blocked, but it gets him under, enough to flip him to the ground. Baker’s lips curl as he rolls back to his feet, warding Zayn off with his knives. “I’ve always done it before. And you’re injured now.”

Zayn doesn’t answer. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care what Baker’s said, what he’s done, that Zayn’s injured. He just knows that Baker’s a danger and he has to be stopped and he will be. _Doubt’s why you lose. Don’t doubt. You’re going to win. And who knows, pretty boy—you’re about good enough you might._ His bow to Baker’s throat, then twisted to his temple, his fist to his ribs. Pull back, ignore the leg that might give out at any second, arrow to his chest, he’s dodging that and one to his arm, where he hit Zayn before, and that goes through and the knife’s on the ground, and Zayn kicks it away. _Don’t think, react. Let your body carry you, it knows better than your brain_. Down, under, roll as he attacks, then up and arrow to the hamstrings, that missed, another as he turns, shoulder hit.

Baker’s not laughing now, not talking. He’s just moving, knife and fist, and Zayn falls back a step, closer to the wall, so Baker thinks he has the advantage and charges, and— _we are small, play the rabbit._ Baker lunges, Zayn jumps, pushes off the wall, legs around this neck and twist, and he’s on the ground and Zayn’s got a knee on his back and leverage and then one more smashing hit with his bow and he’s out, unconscious.

“Passion wins fights, asshole,” Zayn mutters, and hits him over the head one more time.

“Arrow, drop your bow!” Zayn waits another beat, to see if Baker gets up, but he’s down.

“Arrow, drop your bow or they die!” That gets Zayn’s attention, and he’s up with an arrow on his bow—and then he freezes.

Waters has the knife. Waters is behind Harry’s chair, and Waters has the knife, and it’s pressed to Harry’s throat. Harry, who’s tied up, who’s trapped there with a knife at his throat _Whose life, Malik? Shado or yours? Choose fast, tick tock tick tock_.

“You’re going to drop your bow,” Waters is saying, her voice high and fast. “You’re going to drop your bow and let me go, and I won’t kill him.”

Harry’s face is very, very white, and everything’s written there, all the emotion’s there, all his fear, and Zayn— _the blood gushing from Shado’s throat_ —

“I’ll do it!” Waters’ hand is shaking. “I don’t want to but I will! Put the bow down!”

“Let him go,” Zayn gets out, in the Arrow’s voice. His bow hand isn’t shaking. He doesn’t know how. “Don’t do this.”

“This is all your fault! If you hadn’t messed everything up, they’d be happy! Everyone would be safe!” The knife scratches against Harry’s skin as she rants, and there’s a drop of blood, and Harry winces. Zayn’s hand tightens on his bow, adjusting his aim, but he can’t shoot for fear of hitting Harry. Fear. Fear and rage, and he can’t—not another one. Not Harry. Harry will not be one of his ghosts. “I will, Arrow, drop it—”

Zayn isn’t looking at her. He can just look at Harry, and very, very slowly, Harry shakes his head. His mouth moves, forming words. ‘ _love you_ ,’

“Don’t—” But before the word’s out of Zayn’s mouth Harry’s throwing himself backwards, so the chair tips, and Waters’ hand moves on the knife and then the chair’s fallen backwards and hit the ground with a crack and Harry hits with a thump and Waters has stumbled back and Zayn’s there, over her, his arrow pointed at her eye.

“I told you the next one is in your eye,” he growls.

“You don’t kill people,” Waters stares up at him. She doesn’t look afraid, she looks—sure. “You aren’t even enough to do that. You don’t get it. That sometimes people have to die so we can live safe.”

“I understand that.” Zayn’s pulls back the string. Her knife at Harry’s throat. Her hand, behind the bombs, the poison. Behind so many people who almost died, and no remorse, no hesitation. He knows evil. He’s seen evil. He’s killed evil before, his arrow in Fyer’s throat, his bullets in Ivo’s chest. _Killing is sometimes necessary,_ Shado had said once.

_Predators don’t hesitate. Kill or be killed, and you’d rather kill._

_There’s one way to stop him. He dies._

_Whose life, Malik? Shado or yours? Choose fast, tick tock tick tock_.

He’d killed Ivo. Killed him for what he’d done to Shado, to Slade, to Zayn. Why should this be different, for what she tried to do?

“I sent you a message. I said that if you ever hurt anyone I cared about again, you would wish I was merciful.” He draws back the arrow. “It turns out I’m not.”

“Arrow.”

Zayn’s muscles are tensed. Waters is staring up at him, her eyes wide with shock as she realizes. She knows. Now she needs to die twice over.

“Arrow.” Harry’s voice again. Like Shado’s voice in his head, like Slade’s. “Zayn.” Scared. Scared of Zayn, of what he can do, like he always has been. Scared, because Zayn’s not the boy he loved, because Zayn’s a monster now, and it’s because of people like her that’s true. He’s hurt, because of people like her. “Zayn. Don’t do it.”

“She deserves to die.” Zayn hisses it out. His arm is screaming with the effort of holding back the string.

“Maybe, but that’s not your call.” Hands on his shoulders. Big, gentle hands. Soothing. Like they’d soothed him from the nightmares. “Zayn. You aren’t on the island anymore. You can be more than that.”

“She—”

“Be more than that,” Harry repeats, and his hands are on Zayn’s arm, easing it down, and somehow Zayn is going, lowering the bow, until the arrow clatters to the floor.

Then Zayn turns, and there’s Harry, and he’s got his arms around him and he’s whole and okay and he’s here, he’s not another ghost, he’s hugging Zayn like he can’t bear the thought of letting him go and Zayn holds him back just as tight. He’s not sure what he’s saying in his ear, but he just knows Harry hears it, is murmuring his own nonsense at Zayn, as the sun sets outside.

Until, “This is sweet and cinematic and all,” Louis says, the smile clear in his voice, “But maybe one of you could untie me so we can start cleaning this up?”

\---

Zayn doesn’t quite carry Harry to bed, but Harry’s pretty sure it’s a near thing, given how he’s been hovering next to Harry since they left the warehouse, his arm around Harry every time he takes a step, how he’d pored over the cut on Harry’s neck, the abrasions on his wrists from the ropes, the bruises where he’d hit the ground. Hovering, but gentle, so careful as he touched each one, bandaged them, his face drawn.

“Why are we here?” Harry asks, when Zayn’s got him settled in his bed.

“I’m not letting you out of my sight.” Zayn finishes fluffing his pillow, then settles on the side of the bed. Despite his words, there’s plenty of space between them, plenty of space where Zayn’s not touching him. It’s probably good. They probably need to say these things, somewhere other than a warehouse where Harry’d had a knife to his throat.

“Why here, though? Why not my house?”

“I have better security than you.” Zayn’s hand is smoothing over the blanket, back and forth, and he watches it, not Harry. “Just—we can get your house a better security system, then you can go back. I’ll sleep on the floor here until then.”

“The floor?” Harry repeats. He doesn’t—is Zayn sleeping on the floor again? He doesn’t want Zayn that far away. He wants Zayn holding him like he had in that warehouse. He needs Zayn there, because the one time Zayn had left Harry’s eyesight to make sure the police didn’t find the Arrow at the scene, the panic attack had started, everything he’d been keeping down, and it was only when Zayn was there that it was better. Maybe that would fade. But right now he needs Zayn. “Why?”

“Don’t you want that?” Zayn’s brows draw together, and he looks so young. Not even like he had when he was actually young, but just—young and open, his hair messy, his face freshly scrubbed so the Arrow eye shading’s gone. “Don’t you not want me near you?”

“I don’t—Zayn.”

“It was my fault, though.” Zayn rubs at his ear. He’s still not looking at Harry. “It was my fault you got hurt, and I couldn’t stop it, and you were already mad at me for, like everything else, so I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“Zayn.” Harry scoots over so he can grab Zayn’s hand. It hadn’t trembled at all in the warehouse, not even when it was pointed to kill. But now it’s trembling. Because of Harry. “Zayn, I don’t hate you.”

Zayn lifts wide eyes to him, shaded by his eyelashes. “You should. It’d be safer.”

Maybe it would be. Both physically and to Harry’s heart. But he’d made a choice, and he’d believed, in that warehouse. Believed in Zayn, believed in the Arrow, believed in what they were doing. Enough to tip that chair, not sure of what would happen with the knife, just sure that he was a liability as he was and that Zayn wouldn’t do what he had to while Harry was there.

And in that moment, that instant as he threw his weight back—he’d been so glad the last thing he’d said to Zayn was that he loved him. That was more important. The mission, and that.

“I don’t. It wasn’t your fault anyway, she was crazy, wanted to kidnap Louis and me so we’d confess our love or something, it had nothing to do with you.” Harry lifts his hand to Zayn’s cheek, so he can keep it looking at him. “And even if it had, if it was because of the Arrow—I chose to put that audio up. You didn’t force me into it. That wasn’t your fault either.”

“I couldn’t save you.” His gaze flicks to Harry’s neck, where a bandage is pressing.

“In case you didn’t notice, you did.” Harry tries for a smile, but Zayn’s still so solemn, like he had been right after he got back.

“Maybe I won’t next time, and next time it will be because of the Arrow—”

“And I chose that.” Harry insists, and he hears it in his voice, the certainty. That sort of passion he’d never known before, outside a stage. “I chose that, Zayn. Don’t take that away from me. I chose that, and I chose to do that thing with my chair in the warehouse. And,” he goes on, before Zayn can say anything, can push his guilt onto anything else, “I’m sure Shado chose to go with you when she got killed, and everyone else you think you got killed. We chose.” He strokes his finger over Zayn’s cheekbones, under his eyes. “I chose this. Not you.”

“I’m not going to stop being the Arrow. Not even now this is done. I’m doing good.” Zayn’s voice is quiet, but this time he does meet Harry’s eyes. Those dark eyes, the ones Harry’s lost himself in since he was a teenager. He’d run from it, he’d tried to escape it, but Liam was right. There’s nothing else for him. No one else. No one who could compare. “If you can’t handle it, I get it, you just want to help the Arrow not me—”

“I love you.” It comes easily. It doesn’t even hurt, like Harry might have thought. Those words he’s never said before. “I’m in love with you. I thought it would hurt too much, losing you if I’d said that, but not saying it hurt just as much. I love you.”

“Harry.” He’s not saying it back, Harry can’t help but notice, but—but he’d saved Harry, but he’d held him like he’d die if he let go, but he’s tended so gently to Harry. And he’s not the boy he was ten years ago, who fell in love at the drop of a hat, who said it just as easily. Harry knows that. He doesn’t need that boy. He loves this man, with all his faults and ghosts. “I’m not—I’m fucked up, I know I am. I don’t know if I can put myself back together again. I would have killed Waters if you hadn’t talked me down. That’s not, it’s not who you should be with. Someone like that. You deserve—”

“I choose who I deserve.” He tugs, as Zayn comes, moving closer to Harry so he can hover over him. “And if you’re going too far, I’ll be here to bring you back. To remind you that you’re Zayn as well as the Arrow.”

“Harry—”

“Zayn,” Harry sighs. This part of Zayn hasn’t changed. “Will you just kiss me already?”

Zayn laughs, and his eyes are sparkling as he leans down to do as he’s told.

\---

Zayn’s tense. Harry runs his hand over Zayn’s side to soothe him, over the smooth fabric of his suit. The limo is pulling to a stop as he says, “You’ll be fine.”

Zayn gives him a not very enthusiastic smile. “Shouldn’t I be telling you that?”

Harry laughs, and presses a kiss to his cheek. It gets him close enough that he can whisper to Zayn without anyone else in the limo hearing, “You faced down a guy probably three times your size yesterday. You can do this.”

“Reporters are scarier,” Zayn retorts, but then the limo’s pulling to a stop, and the door is opening to a hail of flashes.

Harry gets out first, then waits for Zayn. Zayn blinks as the camera flashes hit him, but no one could ever tell he was nervous before; he’s smiling and relaxed, as easy as he’d ever been on the red carpet, as handsome as ever in the suit he and Caroline had spent a long hour picking out. They look good together, Harry knows—they’d looked good in the mirror before they’d left, Zayn murmuring how proud he was of Harry in his ear as Harry tried not very hard to convince him they shouldn’t muss their suits before they went, and given the speed of the flashes, they look good now, walking the red carpet.

It’s not a big event—Never Forget is still more of an indie film, for all the big names they’ve tempted to the premiere, but it doesn’t stop reporters from cornering them the moment they get a few steps in.

“So, Harry—Never Forget, the movie premiere! Are you excited?” the woman asks, her blonde curls brushing her cheeks.

“Yeah, definitely. It’s a different thing than for music, we don’t have these premieres.” Harry decides not to mention that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been to these before. It’s not worth it. “This’ll be the first time I see the film in its final form, so I’m excited about that.”

“And what does the Arrow think about the film? Has he seen it?”

Harry laughs. Zayn, next to him, doesn’t react at all, though his hand finds Harry’s, squeezes. “I don’t see how he would have. If he tells me anything, I’ll let you know.”

“I’m sure that’s the review you’re most waiting for.”

Harry grins. “More important than Rotten Tomatoes, definitely.”

She laughs. “Then, excuse me, I know this is your night, but I have to say—hi, Zayn!”

Zayn raises a hand, smiling that lopsided grin he does when he’s not sure what to do with his face or hands. “Hey.”

“This is your first red carpet since you returned, right?”

“First since a month or so after One Direction, actually,” Zayn agrees. “’s been a long time.”

“Well, you’re still as good at it as ever. Not that seeing the two of you together is ever anything less than striking—and exciting I know, for a lot of fans! Can you give me the scoop, was this a thing when you were in One Direction as well?” She gestures at their held hands, and presumably the camera zooms in.

Harry meets Zayn’s eyes, and takes this one. “And I pined for five years? I think there’s plenty of evidence that’ll say that didn’t happen.” He laughs cheekily, and the reporter chuckles. Zayn’s smiling fondly at him. It’s making it hard to think. “No, this is a recent thing.”

“Harry helped a lot when I was readjusting,” Zayn jumps in. He swings their hands, so they bump Harry’s thigh. “It just…sort of happened.”

“So romantic.” The reporter’s sigh is a little overdone, but Harry’s just happy that’s the general reaction. They hadn’t been sure, when they’d discussed going public, but it was never in Zayn’s nature to hide things like this, and Harry’d found that with Zayn, he didn’t want to hide him. It wasn’t anyone’s business but their own, but Harry wanted Zayn with him all the time. He wasn’t going to hide that. “Now, Zayn, I hear we might be getting something new from you as well? Is the rumor true, are you back in the studio?”

Zayn shrugs, but he gives her a coy look, one of his most deadly ones. “I can’t confirm anything, but, like. I’ve been playing around with things. I’ve got a lot to say, and it’s not, I can’t, like, keep quiet.”

“Well, we’re all looking forward to it.” She shifts her attention back to Harry. “This is your big night, but it looks like your band’s arrived! Were they supportive of this venture?”

Harry glances over, to where Louis, Niall, and Liam are standing. Diana’s next to Liam, smiling shyly at the cameras; Nadia’s tailing Louis, like she has almost constantly since the kidnapping. Niall, it seems, came alone, but it’s his voice Harry hears, responding to the reporter, “Well, all of them are drags, won’t come with me to see Star Lab’s particle accelerator start next month—”

“They’ve all been very supportive,” Harry tells the reporter. “All of us do our own things, and none of that impacts us as a band. If anything, it makes us stronger.” He glances at Zayn. He’s still got that smile on, like his whole heart is in his eyes and it’s all Harry’s. “Now, I think we have to…”

“Of course. Enjoy the movie!”

“You too!” Harry waves goodbye to her, and they move on.

They talk to a few more reporters, answering the same slew of questions, then they’re inside, settling in. Zayn’s still holding Harry’s hand.

The movie goes by in a flash—Harry’s seen it in almost final form, so there’s nothing particularly new here, and it’s all too easy to be critical of himself, though Zayn’s reactions are fun to hear. He’s always been a loud movie watcher. And hearing him try to keep his critiques to himself in the few fight scenes is amusing.

Then they’re out, and Harry’s accepting congratulations, pats on the back and handshakes, and they’re in the limo and at the afterparty. Harry manages to get Zayn on the dance floor for once dance before he’s going a little tense and nervy, so Harry sends him off to get drinks. That’ll get him out of the crowd for a bit, give him time to regroup.

He dances with Liam, with Diane, with Glenne, then he decides that Zayn’s taking too long and goes to find him.

Zayn’s still at the bar, talking with Kevin, Harry drink sitting unnoticed at the bar next to him.

Harry’s lips press together. It’s not that he’s jealous. He doesn’t doubt Zayn or anything. He just…he likes Zayn smiling at him, especially when he’s a little drunk. The premiere wasn’t like the thrill of a show, but he still wants Zayn with him as he comes down, wants to ride high on it with him.

Which he can do. So he goes over, throws himself onto Zayn’s back. Kevin jumps a little, but Zayn doesn’t move, doesn’t stumble. There are distinct advantages to Zayn being badass now.

“Hey, babe.” Zayn turns his head, brushes a kiss against his cheek. “We were just singing your praises a bit.”

“I was just telling him how much fun you were to work with,” Kevin nods.

Harry laughs, nosing at Zayn’s ear. “You didn’t have to lie. He knows what I’m like.”

“Oh, I—”

“I actually need to steal him,” Harry continues, sliding his hand to Zayn’s wrist. “Sorry. Great job, Kevin!”

“You too!” Kevin calls after them, then Harry’s leading Zayn away, out from the bar, out past the dancers, out out out until in some hallway, basically alone, and Harry can press him against a wall properly.

Zayn lets him, his chuckle going breathy as his back hits the wall. “This is stealing me?”

“I needed a review,” Harry murmurs. He braces his hands on either side of Zayn, not so close he could feel trapped. Harry’s heard a bit more about the nightmares Zayn still has sometimes—not everything, he knows there’s still so much Zayn isn’t telling him, so many ghosts Zayn carries—but he knows being caged in is one of them. So he gives Zayn a little space, as he presses into him, kissing his laughter and adrenaline into Zayn’s mouth.

“Yeah?”

“I need to know what the Arrow thought of the film,” Harry breathes. Zayn’s hand is on his neck, and his hips are moving against Harry’s now. “Got to report to the public, you know.”

“He thought—” Zayn cuts himself off to kiss Harry again, long and savoring. Harry doesn’t think he’ll ever get sick of how Zayn kisses. How he kisses Harry. “He thought you stole the show. But he, like. He’s a bit biased.”

“Yeah?” Harry can’t help his grin, the way it lights him up. Forever. He wants that light forever. “Just a bit?”

“Maybe more than a bit.” Zayn’s lips are on his neck now, and Harry presses closer—

“Not to interrupt,” Nadia says, and Harry makes an annoyed sound into Zayn’s mouth. She’s pretty clearly interrupting. “But Zayn. There are birds loose.”

Harry’s arms drop. Zayn’s straightening, changing, the heat in his eyes shifted at the code words, and he steps around Harry, looking back with an apologetic look. “Haz—”

“Go. Do your job.” Harry reaches out, tugs him back for a quick, hard kiss. “Then come back to me.”

“Always,” Zayn breathes. His promise, the promise he makes every time he leaves—the promise Harry knows he can’t guarantee he’ll keep. But the promise is enough. The promise, and the certainty that if he breaks it it’ll be for a greater reason than this. “Love you.”

Harry watches him go, then takes a deep breath, and joins the party again, making Zayn’s excuses. Carrying Zayn’s promise with him, it’s easy.

\---

_The moon is full over the city, bright enough to cast light, to illuminate the figure on the rooftop. He stands straight, his hood drawn low, his hand on his bow, as he looks over the streets._

_A scream splits the air, and his head goes up, turns towards the sound. His bow is drawn, in his hand—and the Arrow leaps from the rooftop, ready to hunt._


	13. Deleted Scenes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonus features! Some deleted scenes that were taken out for various reasons from the actual fic, but happened.

**[During Chapter 2]**

_The woman’s walk is purposeful, despite the height of her heels. It has the same panache with which she wears the tight clothes of someone half her age, the same carelessness with which she throws her bag onto the couch as she enters her apartment. She keeps the heels on as she unwraps her coat and throws it after her bag, though not before she extracts her phone from it._

_She continues to flip through her phone as she walks through the chic, minimalist apartment. Though someone close to her might notice a slight hint of alcohol on her breath, it is no where to be found in the way she strides across the room towards the kitchen, flicking through items on her phone as she does._

_“Genevieve Coleman.” She spins at the sound of the voice, her eyes widening as she gasps. A man stands in front of the window, in dark leather and a hood. A bow is drawn, the arrow pointed at her. “Do you have a confession?”_

_The phone falls from her fingers, hitting the floor with a sharp thump. She winces; he does not. “What would you like to know?” she asks, with shaking hands. “I have money, art. You can take it.”_

_“What do you know about Charles Caldwell?”_

_“Charles? Dear Charles.” Her voice doesn’t shake, but her gaze darts away. “Such a tragedy.”_

_The bowstring draws back farther. “A lie is not a confession.”_

_“It was a tragedy,” she protests, her voice going faster. “It had to happen, but a tragedy! He was always too sanctimonious. I didn’t—it wasn’t me! I didn’t do it.”_

_“What didn’t you do?” he demands. Her gaze flits around the room. He doesn’t move._

_“Nothing!”_

_The arrow hits a glass on the rack behind her head; it shatters, and she cries out, a harsh sob. “What didn’t you do?” he repeats._

_“I didn’t do anything!” she repeats, almost a sob this time. “I just got him the seat on the plane! I didn’t know, don’t kill me!”_

_A knock sounds at the door. “Ms. Coleman?” a voice comes—the doorman. “There was a crash. Are you okay?”_

_“No!” she yells, spinning to look at the door—but by the time it’s open, the man in the hood is gone, the window open onto the hundred feet drop to the street._

 

***** 

**[Between Chapters 3 and 4]**

 

“Hi—oh,” Harry cuts himself off, swallowing. It’s just… a lot. Zayn’s always been a lot, but now he’s older, broader; there’s muscle everywhere Harry can see, glistening wet. He’s wet everywhere, from the hair pulled long and straight by it, to the drops falling down his neck, to his collarbone, sinking into his t-shirt…

“Harry?”

“Were you swimming?” It’s the first thing he can think to say. He’s out of practice, at ignoring this feeling around Zayn. He’d used to be so good at pushing it down, acting normally. But its so much more now.

“Yeah. Just getting some laps in.” Zayn shrugs, steps back so that Harry can come in.

Harry kneels down to pet Rhino hello, which gives him a bit of time to recollect himself. He’s seen Zayn at basically every stage of dress and undress, has seem him in drag and during quick changes and pulling off clothes because he was high and bundled up because he was cold. He should be used to it by now. Except this isn’t the Zayn of five years ago, who’d been gorgeous but skinny, all bones and angles. This Zayn isn’t large still, is still lean, but it’s all muscles now, every bit of him honed.

“You know how to swim?”

“I spent five years on an island,” Zayn replies, like it’s obvious, which in retrospect it probably was. “I’d have died if I didn’t swim.”

Harry manages not to wince. He knows that—he lived with the fact of Zayn’s mortality for five long years—but there’s something in the matter of fact way he says it that makes it worse. He remembers Zayn after his grandfather’s death, the way he’d crumbled into himself; remembers how Zayn had used to look at the water sometimes when he thought no one was looking, like the depths would reach out and pull him in. And now he’s mentioning his own death without missing a beat, casual. It’s almost chilling.

“So that’s all we had to do?” Harry tries joking, gently. He’s still not sure how much Zayn will take, sometimes; Zayn had always been prickly and he’s not sure what’s been exacerbated by his ordeal and what’s the same. “Liam’ll be thrilled to know that. Just had to threaten your life, then you’d learn to swim.”

Zayn blinks, like he’s forgotten how to react, then he grins, not quite his old big grin—there’s still something wry in it, something a little measured, but it’s something, enough that Harry grins back, helpless as he’s always been in the face of Zayn’s smile. “I don’t think Liam could have made me properly believe it, like.”

“I bet Louis could’ve.” Harry wrinkles his nose. “He’s made me afraid for my life, a time or two.”

“No.” Zayn’s voice is so utterly certain, it sounds like a black hole. “He couldn’t.”

There’s a moment of silence, in which Harry remembers that Zayn actually knows what it means to have his life threatened, knows what it means to stand on that edge of life and death. Or he guesses; he doesn’t know what happened on that island, but Zayn’s reactions make it clear a lot did.

“Well, I’ve had my life threatened recently, so I would know,” Harry says, to break the silence. He’s been trying not to think about it—about either of the times, and there is something about them that make them feel unreal, but it’s true. “I’m a bit of a professional on this.”

He means it to make Zayn laugh, but instead his lips press together, and his eyes go sharp. “Has something else happened?”

Harry’s heart thumps. For a second, he’s back on stage, feeling Zayn’s hands guiding him away from fire; he’s falling and finding Zayn’s hands catching him; he’s in an interview and Zayn’s throwing an arm around Harry’s shoulders defending him. It’s the same, the way his heart goes faster.

The thing that’s different now is Harry has a name for it, doesn’t bother pretending it’s just friendship. Doesn’t bother thinking about the barriers between them, because most of them aren’t there—Zayn’s not engaged. Zayn’s not in the band. Zayn’s not _dead_. And yet,

“No,” Harry says, shaking his head. “Nothing since that thing with the Arrow and me and Louis and Niall.”

“That was twice, though. The second time.”

“What a coincidence, right?” Harry shrugs, and stands back up. It means he has to really look at Zayn, all wet and beautiful, but that is a price he’s willing to pay. “I’ve never been mugged before, then twice in a few weeks.”

“Yeah.” Zayn’s face doesn’t really change, but Harry’s pretty sure he’s thinking, going back into himself, and that’s not what Harry wanted.

“Maybe it’s you,” he says, as something to divert. “You came back and then I was mugged. That’s a pretty iffy coincidence.”

Once it might have gotten a laugh, or something flirtatious. Now, Zayn bites on his lip, but he meets Harry’s gaze firmly as he asks, “You saying I’m bad luck, Harry?”

“No!”

“You might not be wrong.” Zayn shrugs, and his gaze drops, his hand running over Rhino. “Are you coming to drag me to the park too?”

“No, I thought—dinner? Have you eaten?”

“Out? Or here?”

Zayn’s shoulders are tense, his fingers running over his thighs. “Whichever you’d want,” Harry says, slowly. He doesn’t want to push him. He doesn’t want him to shut off, or run away. “We could find someplace quiet. Or we could put something together here.”

“Um.” Zayn runs a hand through his hair, glances at the door, then down the hall. “Yeah, sure. Would you mind staying here?”

“Nope. That’s fine.” Harry pauses, then looks down. “Zayn, you’re dripping.”

“What?” Zayn gives the floor a confused look, like he’d forgotten you aren’t supposed to drip onto the wet wood. “Oh, yeah. I should get a towel.”

“Yes, please. Cover yourself.” Harry smirks at Zayn, but it’s probably better for his sanity. Probably better for everything if he isn’t constantly resisting the urge to slide his hands over all the skin teased at under his wet t-shirt, to trace the new muscles, find the places where he’s changed.

Zayn tilts his head, his lips twitching. It doesn’t look like he’d looked when he was in that alley, overwhelmed, so Harry tilts his head back. “What?”

“Just trying to remember if you’ve ever told me to put on a shirt before,” Zayn says, with a bit of a smirk, and Harry makes a face back, trying not to blush.

 

 *****

**[Zayn’s POV of the end of Chapter 6]**

 

He wakes sweating, but quiet. Not a nightmare then, or not really—nothing concrete enough for screams. Just the sort of general unease, the feeling of being exposed.

Zayn scrubs a hand over his face, glances at the window, then the clock. Eleven. That’s five hours of sleep, which isn’t bad. He’s surprised he didn’t have a nightmare, with that much sleep. After the mosque. After the man with the scar had gotten away.

He gets up—and freezes. The door is open. He never sleeps with the door open, can’t get to sleep like that, with that much access. The door is open, which means someone came inside. While he was asleep.

The bow is too far away. The razor would be too difficult, too unwieldy. There are knives in the kitchen. He springs up, shifts his weight to the balls of his feet. He can’t hear anything up here. And where is Rhino? He’d have barked. Unless he couldn’t.

Zayn hisses, then creeps forward. There isn’t anyone upstairs, but he can hear movement downstairs. Why did they stick around? Why not leave, or just put a knife in his throat and be done with it?

More to the point, who could it be? No one knows who he is. And the island…he thinks of Fyers, of Ivo. Of Slade with an arrow in his maddened eye, bleeding out all over his hands. They’re all dead. No more enemies left alive.

There are nails clicking on tile—Rhino. Rhino is awake and alive, and not barking. He turns a corner—and Harry’s sitting on the couch, looking at something on his phone.

Shit. Zayn lets out a long breath. Of course it’s just Harry. Of course.

“How’d you get in?” Zayn asks, and Harry jumps.

“Fuck! I didn’t hear you at all.”

Zayn shrugs, and comes into the room. Rhino comes barreling into his legs, and Zayn rubs a hand over his head. He’s fine. They’re both fine.

“How’d you get in?”

“Louis was leaving as I was coming. He let me in.” Harry’s on his feet, his phone sliding into his pocket. There’s something off about him, his weight distributed differently. He’s nervous. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Zayn rolls out his neck. “Just woke up. Are you okay?”

“Um. Yeah. I just…” Harry runs a hand through his hair, readjusting it. There’s still a safe distance between them, and Zayn’s not sure what that means. Last time he’d seen Harry, they’d been pressed flush against each other, Zayn jerking them both off. Now Harry’s staying away. What does he know? “Do you want coffee? Tea?”

“I want you to tell me what’s wrong.” Zayn’s hand curls into a fist.

Harry’s eyes widen, then he nods, and the determination shows through, the determination that had gotten him through X Factor and all the bullshit that had come after. “Come over here.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to have this conversation across a room.” Harry sighs, then he’s the one who comes over to Zayn, reaches out slowly to take Zayn’s hand. “I don’t bite, Zaynie.”

“Sure you do.” It gets a grin out of Harry, a flash of dimples, but then they fade. Still, that flash is enough for Zayn to let Harry lead him to the couch, sit him down. Harry takes a seat on the coffee table, fitting himself in between Zayn’s legs.

“Okay. So. I looked in, when you were sleeping.”

“Creepy.” How did Zayn sleep through that? How could he? He needs to put a bell on the door, something. He should have woken up. What if it had been someone else?

“Not—I just wanted to see if you were really asleep. Louis said he wasn’t sure.” Harry’s hand tightens on his knees. His jeans are ripped in the knees today, a parody of rags that probably cost thousands of dollars. “But…Zayn, why were you sleeping on the floor?”

He can’t deny. Harry clearly saw. So instead, Zayn shrugs. “The bed’s too soft.”

“I thought you said you dreamed of a bed.” Harry still has that stupid concerned look on his face, like Zayn might explode. Like he’s dangerous. Which he is, but, he doesn’t want Harry to know that. To look at him like that. Like he’s as broken as Zayn knows he is.

“I did. But I guess I was wrong.” Zayn makes to get up, but then Harry’s hands are on his, holding him there. “Harry…”

“Zayn. You need to sleep on a bed.” Harry squeezes both of Zayn’s hands. “You can’t sleep on the floor.”

“Why not?”

“Don’t be stupid. You’ve been hiding it, you know why not.”

“No, tell me.” Zayn snaps it. He doesn’t need Harry. He doesn’t need Harry thinking about him. “Why can’t I sleep on the floor if I want to?”

“Because you aren’t on the island anymore!” Harry’s voice is as sharp as Zayn’s, as sudden, and his hands tighten on Zayn’s wrists. He reacts without thought, to the feel of someone grabbing him; he jerks his hands away, breaking the hold, then his hands are on Harry’s wrists, holding them bruisingly tight.

As soon as it happens, Zayn lets go, hopefully soon enough; drops Harry’s hands like they burn, pushes himself back away from Harry as far as he can go. Harry pulls his hands back, his eyes wide.

For a second, they stare at each other, Zayn pressed against the couch, away from Harry, away from how he could hurt him; Harry with his hands raised, palms out. He’s so…he just looks so good, so lovely always, with his hair and his strong jaw and beautiful eyes. He looks innocent. Like none of Zayn’s darkness has ever touched him, could ever touch him. But Zayn knows that it could. That too easily, he could scar that rosy skin, could make his gaze turn from concern to pain and disgust.

Then Harry sighs, and drops his hands back to his own knees. “You aren’t on the island anymore, Zayn.” Now his voice is soft, the placating tone he always used on people he wanted things from. “We can get you a firmer mattress, or figure that out. But you’re off the island.”

Now it’s Zayn’s turn to move slowly, in case Harry will spook, like he should. Softly, he takes Harry’s wrist, turns it over to see if there’s any bruising. It’s just a little red, thank god.

“See? No harm done.” He can hear the smile in Harry’s voice, but he doesn’t get it. Doesn’t understand that this is the least of the damage he could do.

“I don’t think I am.” Zayn looks up at Harry. Zayn can’t tell him, can’t make himself say all of it, make Harry stay away like he should. But he needs to understand. “I don’t think I can ever leave it.”

Harry’s hands move in Zayn’s, so he’s holding Zayn again, can bring his hands up to his mouth, brush his lips over Zayn’s knuckles. He doesn’t know what those knuckles have done, what those hands have done, but he kisses them all the same. “I do,” he says, simply, and Zayn’s not sure he’s ever heard conviction like that in Harry’s voice. It’s almost enough to make him believe.

 

*****

**[During Chapter 11]**

 

“You did what?”

“Planted a bug.” Zayn grins at Louis. “Last night—”

“You went out, last night. Injured. Without me knowing.” Louis’s voice is flat.

“Yes, I had an idea—”

“You don’t do that.”

“Louis, listen—”

“No.” Louis grabs at his wrist, and Zayn lets him catch it, as it’s his uninjured one. “No. You go out injured, whatever, I don’t know if I could convince you out of it. But you tell me.”

“I—”

“You’re not alone.” Louis’s hand is on his shoulder now, shaking. “We’re in this together, okay? I can’t be out there. But I can make sure you stay alive when you are.”

“There wasn’t time.”

“There could have been.” Louis shakes him once more. “It’s a phone call.” He lets go, leans back against the table. It’s the first time in a while Zayn’s noticed that he’s older than Zayn’s memory of him. Older, heavier. He’s not Peter Pan. “Zayn. I couldn’t help you, on that plane. I’m going to be bloody well sure I do this time.”

Zayn lets out a breath. He’d—he’d forgotten, maybe. In the past five years, in the past six years. What it meant, to have a brother.

“Yeah. I’ll call next time.”

“Good. Now.” Louis’s gaze narrows. “You bugged Waters’ office? To do what? Nadia can’t leak it, there’s no guarantee it would get picked up, or that anyone would trust it’s coming from the Arrow. Definitely not in two days.” ”

“What do we have, Lou?” Zayn gestures around. “We have my bow and arrow. We have Nadia.”

“So?”

“And,” Zayn draws out. He hasn’t felt this good in years. This is good. This is going to work. No one will die in their beds, poisoned by a few people’s fear. “And we have thirty million twitter followers.”

“Zayn—Zayn.” Louis’s jaw drops. “We do. We have that. Well, you don’t, the Arrow’s account isn’t verified or anything, but—we do.”

“She’ll say something. Something incriminating in the next few days, or I’ll drop in on her. And then—” Zayn grins, fierce and predatory. “Then everyone will know. They killed someone to keep this quiet. I don’t think it’ll stand up to the light of day.”

“And well done Team Arrow.” Louis holds out his fist, Zayn rolls his eyes but bumps it. “Now we just have to wait to hear something incriminating.”

“I got her phone and her office. It’ll happen.”

“And we listen.” Louis sits down, turns to his computer to start fiddling on it. “You just had transmittable recording devices lying around?”

“They’re good to have.” Zayn shrugs, and perches on the table.

“Yeah.” Louis pushes a few more buttons, then he looks up at Zayn, his eyes sympathetic. “You know—this wouldn’t be best coming from me. Or you. We aren’t the one people know the Arrow knows. The one who’s spoken for the Arrow.”

“Yeah.” Zayn sighs, and runs a hand through his hair. He’d thought of that. “I know. Let’s listen.”

“Three day listening party. Get some weed, it’ll be just like old times,” Louis jokes, and Zayn snorts as he settles in.

**Author's Note:**

> Liked it? Want to discuss? Comment or come chat on [ tumblr!](http://zaynandhisboys.tumblr.com/)


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